and Formalists were not now broad enough nor of sufficient force The King's Party as their Serious Word called the Parliaments Party Rebels and as their common ludiâ—rous Name The Round-heads the original of which is not certainly known Some say it was because the Puritans then commonly wore short Hair and the King's Party long Hair Some sâ—y it was because the Queen at Strafford's Tryal asked who that Round-headed Man was meaning Mr. Pym because he spake so strongly The Parliaments Party called the other side commonly by the Name of Malignants as supposing that the generality of the Enemies of serious Godliness went that way in a desire to destroy the Religious out of the Land And the Parliament put that Name into their Mouths and the Souldiers they called Cavaliers because they took that Name to themselves and afterwards they called them Damme's because God Damn me was become a common Curse and as a By-word among them The King professed to sight for the Subjects Liberties the Laws of the Land and the Protestant Religion The Parliament profest the same and all their Commissions were granted as for King and Parliament for the Parliament professed that the Separation of the King from the Parliament could not be without a Destruction of the Government and that the Dividers were the Destroyers and Enemies to the State and if the Soldiers askt each other at any Surprize or Meeting who are you for those on the King's side said for the King and the others said for King and Parliament the King disowned their Service as a Scorn that they should say they fought for King and Parliament when their Armies were ready to charge him in the Field They said to this 1. That they fought to redeem him from them that took him a voluntary Captive and would separate him from his Parliament 2. That they fought against his Will only but not against his Person which they desired to rescue and preserve nor against his Authority which was for them 3. That as all the Courts of Justice do execute their Sentences in the King's Name and this by his own Law and therefore by his Authority so much more might his Parliament do § 52. But now we come to the main matter What satisfied so many of the intelligent part of the Countrey to side with the Parliament when the War began What inclined their Affections I have before shewed and it is not to be doubted but their Approbation of the Parliament in the cause of Reformation made them the easilier believe the lawfulness of their War But yet there were some Dissenters which put the matter to debates among themselves In Warwickshire Sir Francis Nethersole a religious Knight was against the Parliaments War and Covenant though not for the Justness of the War against them In Glocestershire Mr. Geree an old eminent Nonconformist and Mr. Copell a learned Minister who put out himself to prevent being put out for the Book of Recreations and some others with them were against the lawfulness of the War so was Mr. Lyford of Sherborn in Dorcetshire and Mr. Francis Bampfield his Successor and some other Godly Ministers in other Countries And many resolved to meddle on no side Those that were against the Parliaments War were of three Minds or Parties One Part thought that no King might be resisted but these I shall not take any more notice of The other thought that our King might not be at all resisted because he is our Sovereign and we have sworn to his Supremacy and if he be Supreme he hath neither Superior nor Equal And Oaths are to be interpreted in the strictest Sense The third sort granted that in some Cases the King might be resisted as Bilson and other Bishops hold but not in this Case 1. Because the Law giveth him the Militia which was contended for and the Law is the measure of Power 2. Because say they the Parliament began the War by permitting Tumults to deprive the Members of their Liberty and affront and dishonour the King 3. Because the Members themselves are Subjects and took the Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy and therefore have no Authority to resist 4. It is not lawful for Subjects to defend Reformation or Religion by Force against 〈◊〉 Soveraigns no such good Ends will warrant evil Means 5. It is contrary to the Doctrine of Protestants and the ancient Christians and Scripture it selfe which condemneth all that resist the higher Powers and as for the Primitive Christiansâ— it is well known they were acquainted with no other lawful Weapons against them but Prayers and Tears 6. It importeth a false Accusation of the King as if he were about to destroy Religion Liberties or Parliaments all which he is resolved to defend as in all his Declarations doth appear 7. It justifieth the Papists Doctrine and Practices of Rebellion and taketh the Odium from them unto our selves and layeth a Reproach upon the Protestant Cause 8. It proceedeth from Impatience and Distrust of God which causeth Men to fly to unlawful means Religion may be preserved better by patient Sufferings These were their Reasons who were against the Parliaments War which may be seen more at large in Mr. Dudly Digs his Book and Mr. Welden's and Mr. Michael Hudson's and Sir Francis Nethersole's § 53. As for those on the Parliaments side I will first tell you what they said to these Eight Reasons and next what Reasons moved them to take the other side 1. To the First Reason they said as before that for the Law to give the King the â—â—â—â—itia signifieth no more but that the People in Parliament consented to obey him in Matter of Wars and to fight for him and under his Conduct For the Law is nothing but the Consent of King and Parliament and the Militia is nothing but the Peoples own Swords and Strength And that this Consent of theirs should be supposed to be meant against themselves as if they consented to destroy themselves whenever he commanded it is an Exposition against Nature Sense and Reason and the common Sentiments of Mankind And they said that the same Law required Sheriffs to exercise the Militia in Obedience to the Decrees of his Courts of Justice and this against the King's Personal Commands and in the King's Name Because King and Parliament have by Law setled those Courts and Methods of Execution a Command of the King alone can no more prevail against them than it can abrogate a Law And the Law said they is above the King because King and Parliament are more than the King alone And they pretend also Presidents for their Resistance 2. To the Second they said that when 200000 Protestants were murdered in Ireland and their Friends so bold in England and the Parliaments Destruction so industruously endeavoured it was no time for them to rebuke their Friends upon terms of Civility and good Manners though their Zeal was mixt with Indiscretion and that if the Londoners had not shewed that Zeal
for them it might have emboldned their Enemies against them and that if the permitting of Petitioners to crowd to them too boldly and speak too unmannerly can be called the raising of a War when they fought with none but were assaulted themselves then the calling up of the Army from the North was much more so and so they were not the Beginners Or had they been the Beginners it had been lawful being but to bring Delinquents to Justice as the Sheriff himself may in Obedience to a Court of Justice But the Irish Flames which threatned them were kindled before all these 3. To the third they said that the Parliament are Subjects limitedly and not simply as the King is not an absolute but a limited King viz. limited by the Laws and Constitutions of the Government they are Subjects to him according to Law but not subject to Arbitrary Government against Law Their Propriety is excepted in their Subjection and they have certain Liberties which are not subject to the Will of the King And also they said That as the Sheriff is a Subject and a Court of Justice Subjects and yet may resist the King's Letters even under the Broad-Seal and his Messengers or armed Men that act illegally because the Law which hath his Authority and the Parliament's enable them so to do so also may the Parliament which is his highest Court of Justice And they said that as they have a part in the Legislative Power they have part in the Summa Potesâ—â—as and so far are not Subjects And they said that the bare Title of Supreme is no Argument against the Constitution of a Kingdom though it be expressed in an Oath For the King is stiled the Supreme Governor of France and yet the Oath of Supremacy doth not bind us to believe that no French Man may lawfully â—ear Arms against him 4. They say to the fourth That they wholly grant it that though Religion may be the end of a lawful War yet not of a Rebellion nor may any Reformations be performed by any Actions which belong not to the Places and Callings of the Performers But where the means are Lawful Religion and Reformation are lawful Ends. 5. To the fifth they said That they agree with all good Christians and Protestants that true Authority may not be resisted by any Subject But all Protestants or most agree with them that a limited Governor which hath not Authority to do what he lists may perform an Act of Will which is no Act of Authority and that the Parliament was the highest Judicature and that it was Rebellion in them that resisted the Parliament in their legal prosecution of Delinquents and Defence of the Land and themselves and that Paul Rom. 13. determineth not at all whether the Emperors or the Senate was the higher Power and that the Resisters of the Parliament are the condemned Breakers of that Order and Command 6. To the sixth they said that they Charge nothing on the King but what their Eyes behold viz. That he hath forsaken his Parliament and raiseth Arms against them and protecteth Delinquents And this they mention but as Matter of Fact for the culpability they charge upon his evil Counsellors and Instruments For the King being no Subject is liable to no Accusations in any of his 〈…〉 Irish the Papist and those guilty Persons who would ruine all to 〈…〉 Justice whom they accuse and not the King And whateve◠〈…〉 King 's Declarations say Ship-money hath been imposed the Judges have been 〈◊〉 the German Horse were to have been brought in the Northern Army 〈◊〉 have been brought up against the Parliament the House was invaded and 〈◊〉 Members demanded a Guard was set upon them and their Destruction 〈◊〉 Enemies was powerfully endeavoured 7. 〈◊〉 the seventh they said That for the supreme legislative Authority to defend 〈◊〉 and the Land and for the King's Courts of Justice to prosecute Delinâ—◠〈◊〉 though against the King's Will is no dishonour to the Protestant Religion 〈◊〉 any thing like the Papists Doctrine and Practices of Rebellion nor any Justification of them If it were then the very Constitution of our ancient Government or Kingdom would it self be a dishonour to our Religion 8. To the last they say That Patience is our Duty so far as we are called to Sufferings and God is â—o be trusted in the way which he hath appointed us But if the Irish Rebels had foretold the Parliament and Justices of their Insurrection and then exhorted them to Patience and Non-resistance and trusting God or if a Thief that would rob us to exhort us to be patient and not resist he doth but exhort us to be guilty of his Sin 〈◊〉 Protestants Patience was that which pleased the Irish or if a King must be brought in as a Party the French Mens Patience in the Parisian Massacre pleased Charles IX and the Executioners And if in all Countries the Protestants would let the Papists cut their Throats and die in the Honour of Patience it would satisfie those bloody Adversaries who had rather we died in such Honour than lived without it But if such Patience would be a poor Excuse for a Father that sought not to preserve his Children much less for the Paliament that stand still while Papists and Delinquents subvert both Church and State These were their Answers to their Accusers in those Points § 54. The Sum of those Reasons which satisfied many that adhered to the Parliament were these which I will but briefly name 1. As to the Danger of the State the Matters of Fact did make it seem undeniable to them Ship-money they judged not of according to the Sum but they thoughtâ— Propriety was thereby destroyed and Parliaments cast aside and made unnecessary And they saw that this Parliament was called upon the Scots and then called Discontented Lords importunity after many Parliaments had been dissolved in displeasure and after they had been long forborn And the calling up of the Northern Army and the demanding of the Members made Multitudes think that the ruine of the Parliament was the great Design and their ungrateful beginning and proceedings made this seem credible so that I met with few of that sort that doubted of it But above all the Two hundred thousand kill'd in Ireland affrighted the Parliament and all the Land And whereas it is said that the King hated that as well as they They answered that though he did his hating it would neither make all those alive again nor preserve England from their threatned Assault as long as Men of the like malignity were protected and could not be kept out of Arms nor brought to Justice 2. The End of the War did much prevail with them For they thought that to master and destroy the Parliament was to leave the People hopeless as to any Security of their Propriety or Liberties or any Remedy against meer Will For there is no other Power that may relieve them And if Parliaments
In the best sence which hath Evidence of Truth Charity requireth us to take all the words of others But the question is first Which is the true sence and not which is the best And if it can be proved that another is either certainly or probably the true meaning of any words we must not feign a better sence because it is better In the Case in hand the Law-makers have plainly declared their own sence by their Speeches and Votes and deliberate plain Expressions and by another Act for Corporations If I might take all Oaths and Statutes in the best sence which possibly those words may be used to express than I could take almost any Oath in the World and disobey any Law in the World under pretence of obeying it and tell any Lie under the pretence of telling Truth and Jesuitical Equivocation would be but the common Duty of the Charitable But Charity is not blind nor will it prove a fit Cover for a Lie He that knoweth the Parliament and is but willing to know their sence may know the mistakes of this pretended Charity And especially Laws and Oaths are to be taken in the sence which is plainest in the words § 391. Besides all that is already said I shall end this Subject with this question on the Non-subscribers part Whether an Oath doth not bind Men in the sence of the Takers though they be bound to take it in the sence of the Imposers if they know it As if I had been commanded to swear Allegiance to the King and he that commandeth it should mean Cromwell or some Usurper and I thought he had meant my rightful King Am I not bound hereby to the King indeed And if so Query further Whether any Man so well know the sence of every Man and Woman in England Scotland and Ireland as to be able to say that it was so bad that they are not obliged to it And in what Age it was that all Ministers were forbidden to Preach the Gospel of Christ till they knew the Hearts of all the People in three Kingdoms so far as to justifie them before God from the Obligations of such Vows and Oaths § 392. And though I heartily wish that the Prelates would have been intreated to have chosen another course of proceeding with their Brethren and not have tempted any to Repinings or Complaints for endeavouring which I lost their love yet I would admonish all my Brethren to take heed of aggravating this Difference so far as to bring the present Ministry into Contempt and hinder the Efficacy of their Labours I did my best to have prevailed beforehand that we might not have had any occasion of Divisions but if we must needs be divided that it might have been upon some lower Points than the Obligation of Oaths and Vows It had been better for the Prelates that the Non-subscribers had seemed to be scrupulous Persons that refused only some tolerable Ceremonies than that the fear of so great a Crime as justifying three Kingdoms from the Bond of an Oath and the guilt of Perjury should be the occasion of their Ejection and the Matter of this Publick Controversie But seeing this could not by us be prevented let us not be so partial as to wrong the Church by making them odious to justifie our selves It was sad when the Names of Formalists and Puritans and afterwards of Malignants and Rebels and Cavaliers and Roundheads distinguished the divided Parties But it is now grown worse when they are called PER-fidious jured secutors and PURITANS For the most odious Names do most potently tend to the extinguishing of Charity and the increase of the Difference between them § 393. III. The next Controversie is Political That it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever to take up Arms against the King or as is after said against any Commissionated by him In this the Lawyers are divided yea and Parliament themselves one Parliament saying one thing and another another thing And the poor ejected Ministers of England are commonly so little studied in the Law that in these Controversies they must say as they are bidden or say nothing And they think it hard that when Lawyers and Parliaments cannot agree every poor ignorant Preacher must be forced to decide the Controversie and say and subscribe which of them is in the right upon pain of being cast out of their Office and silenced which they think as hard as if they were required to decide a Controversie between Navigators or Pope Zachary and Boniface's Case about the Antipodes or else be silenced We are ready to Subscribe That King Charles the Second is our lawful King and that we owe him Obedience in all his lawful Commands and that we are bound to defend his Person Dignity Authority and Honour with our Lives and Estates against all his Enemies and that neither Parliaments nor any other at home or abroad have any power to judge or hurt his Person or depose him or diminish any of his Power and that it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever to conspire against him or â—stir up the People to Sedition or to take up Arms against either his Authority or his Person or against any lawfully Commissioned by him or any at all Commissioned by him except he himself by a contrary Commission or by his Law do enable us or not forbid us or when the Law of Nature doth oblige us In all these Cases we are ready to Subscribe And one would think this much might procure our Peace But that which is scrupled by the Non-subscribers is as followeth The words on any pretence whatsoever studiously put into a Form of Declaration by a Parliament are so universal as to allow no Latitudinarian Evasions or Limitations or Exceptions by any Man that is sincere and plain-hearted and doth not Equivocate with God and his Governours Now 1. Though the King's Authority or Person may not be resisted by Arms they are not certain that his Will may not in any Case be resisted 2. Though none Authorized that is Legally Commissioned by him may be resisted yet they are not certain that all that are Commissioned by him are Authorized or Legally Commissioned 3. Either this Declaration requireth us to suppose that the King never will Commission any illegally or else that though he do yet such may on no pretence whatsoever be resisted by Arms. If the former be the sence then either it is because no King will do it or only because no King of England will do it The former all Historians Politicians Lawyers and Divines are against And the latter hath no Evidence of Certainty to us But yet if that had been the sence we should have consented that on supposition the King commission Men legally they are not to be resisted But this no Man will say is to be supposed as an Event certainly and universally future But if the worst that is possible might be supposed possible then in these several Cases
they are doubtful 1. In Case that a Man pretend to have the King's Commission but doth not shew it me what am I then to do 2. In Case he shew it me under the Privy Seal and another shew the Broad Seal to a Commission to resist him 3. In Case he shew the Broad Seal and I know not whether it be counterfeit or surreptitiously procured 4. In Case that by the fault of Officers or forgetfulness or any other cause one Man should have a Commission to defend and command a Ship or Fort or Country and another shew a Commission of the same date to command and defend the same Ship Fort or Country and to resist any that oppose him Is it unlawful for both of them here to obey the King's Command 5. In case that any shall shew or pretend a Commission for any illegal Act as to take Mens Purses by the High-way to break into their Houses and take their Money and Goods and seize their Estates or kill their Families Or to lay a Tax upon the Country without the Consent of Parliament or to ravish Mens Wives or Daughters or to burn the City or if two or three should shew a Commission to come into the House of Lords or Commons and kill them all in the place c. It is certain that a Sword is Arms and that to fight in a Man 's own Defence is to take up Arms Or if any say it must be the fighting of many together only that is called the Taking up of Arms as that is not to be understood by the words which have no such restriction so no Man knoweth how many it must be that by concurrence must make the Act to be a Taking up of Arms. We have put some of these Cases to Parliament Men and they tell us That in any such Case they would use their Arms to defend themselves But these are single Members What the Houses mean we know not but by the words And no words can be more exclusive of any Exception than these That it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever Also what if Saul gives Commission to his Armour bearer to kill him Might not a Subject by Arms defend the King and rescue his Life against his Will and Commission And what if a Court of Justice decree a Subject the Possession of his House and Land and require the Sheriff of the Country to put him in possession and to raise the Posse Comitatus to do it if there be resistance And what if the Person to be ejected shew a Commission from the King to keep possession contrary to this Judgment is it unlawful for the Sheriff to obey the Court And the Posse Comitatus of Yorkshire hath been a considerable Army § 394. The Things which increase the Doubt of the Non-subscribers in this Case are these 1. Because if as it is said by some the Laws are the King's Laws and the Acts of his Will as well as his Commissions are Then if his Law and his Commission be contradictory I must need disobey the King which soever I disobey and resist the King's Will which soever I resist We have no Laws but what are Acts of the King's Will and till they are repealed they still express his Will 2. Because that the Laws are made purposely to be the Subjects Rule of Obedience being also the Rule of Judgment in all Courts and being that Act of the King's Will which the Subjects have publick certain Notice of They know that the Laws are indeed the King's Laws and are not counterfeit And they are of universal Obligation But a Seal to a Commission may possibly be counterfeit or the Subject can have no such certifying notice of it 3. And they know that the King is not himself every where present to tell his doubtful Subjects which signification of his Will he owneth and which they should prefer and that he governeth his Kingdom by his Courts and Officers they sit and send forth their Orders in his Name And a known publick Court of Justice seemeth to be a more credible declarer of the King's Will than a Stranger or particular Person who saith that he hath his Commission It is the Form of the Law to be the Act of the Governing Will of the King and the use of his Courts to declare it and expound it and judge by it for his Subjects But a private Commission wanteth these Advantages 4. Because they think that the Law of Nature and the Constitution of the Kingdom must else submit to this Declaration For if two or three or more shew a Commission to kill all the Parliament and fire the City Nature seemeth to allow them Self-defence and Parliaments which are part of the Constitution are vain if they have no better Security for their Lives 5. They find a Statute of King Edward the Third That if any Man bring from the King a Command under the Little Seal or the Great Seal to require any Judge to go against Justice or to contradict it the Judge shall go on as if it signified nothing And the Sheriff's forcible Assistance may be part of his Judgment or the legal Consequent 6. Else no Subject seemeth to have any Security for his Estate or Life nor the Subject any Liberties For if their Estates or Purses be taken away or their Lives assaulted by pretended Commissions or Taxes imposed contrary to Law what remedy have they To say they may question the Instruments at Law is vain and worse as long as that Law whatever it decreeth must submit to a Commission and must never resist it nor use any force of Arms though against a single Man for its own Execution Who will begin a Suit at Law against the King's Will at all if he first know that his Will must not be resisted and that the End will but be his greater ruine 7. They said King Iames asserting in his Writings for Monarchy that a King may not make War against his whole Kingdom In case then that he should do it they are uncertain that the whole Kingdom might not at all resist his commissioned Officers 8. They find the late King Charles the First in his Answer to the Nineteen Propositions of the Parliament asserting a Protecting Power in the Lords and setting up the Laws above his own Will 9. They know that the Laws are made by King and Parliament and Commissions here supposed to be by the King alone And the whole Authority of all parts seemeth more than of one alone 10. They find that it hath been familiar with Lawyers to prefer the Law before the King's Commissions and Parliaments have been of that mind And they are too weak to Condemn them all in their own Faculties 11. They find that the greatest Defenders of Monarchy of all Forreign Lawyers even Barclay and Grotius have instanced in many Cases in which it is as they say lawful by Arms to resist a King And we pretend not to more
Authority yet upon four other grounds it is lawful to take up Arms against his Army 1. Because as Willius and other Politicians say the Majestas realis is in the People 2. Because some Lawyers say That the People of England have as Hooker and Bâ—lson calls them fore-prized Liberties which they may defend and the Parliament hath part of the Legislative Power by the Constitution of the Kingdom 3. Because the Law of Nature and Charity requireth the Defence of our Selves Posterity and Country 4. And because Scripture requireth the same They that will say That the Oath hath left all these Pleas or Evasions for Fighting against the King's Armies do make it utterly useless to the ends for which it was intended and make the Authors to have been strangely blinded 2. Note That he takes the Word Lawful to extend to all Laws of Nature Scripture or whatever And 3. That he takes these Words It is not Lawful to mean no more than I judge or think it is not Lawful As if all our Parliament Men with the Learned Bishops had not had Wit enough to have said so if they had meant so but said one thing and meant another 4. I confess I stick not much on the Fourth Quaere but its plain that the Subject named is capable of various Predicates yea of contrary and of taking Arms may be applied to an opertet a litet a factum est yea or a non licet though the licet I doubt not is their Sense 5. Note That the Answer to the Fifth is a meer putting off the Answer For the Question is Whether the Act of Parliament or the private Commission be more Authoritative And he answereth That which is Lawful which implieth that he was not willing to speak out 6. Note that he plainly concludeth that a Sheriff hath the King's Authority to resist by the Posse Comitatus the King 's Commissioned Officers that would hinder him from Executing the Decrees of a Court of Justice And doth not this either cross the intent of the Imposers or give up the whole Cause Doth it not grant that either it is lawful by the King's Authority given to the Sheriff by the Law c. for him by Arms to resist the King's Commissioners Or else that they be resisted as not Commissioned because their Commission is unlawful And what did the Parliament's Army desire more If a Sheriff by the Sentence of an inferiour Court may raise Arms against the King's Army as not Commissioned you will teach the Parliament to say That their Judgment is greater than an inferiour Court's 7. And it is possible That Commissions may be contrary of the same date who then can know which is the Traytor 8. The Seventh is a putting off the Answer like the Fifth 9. Note especially that of the Eighth Quaere which implyeth divers Instances of Cases in which Grotius Barclay Bilson c. say That it is Lawful to take Arms against the King he seemeth wholly to grant it and maketh it but like a Cavil to suppose that those Cases ever came into the Parliament's Thoughts And I am much in that of the good Man's Mind But if they will Swear me to an Universal while they forget particular Exceptions that will not make the Oath Lawful to me For 1. It is not certain to me That they would have excepted those things if they had remembred them 2. Much less can I tell which and how many things they would have excepted 3. And how could the wit of Man devise Words more exclusive of all Exceptions than to say It is not Lawful on any pretence whatsoever Are those in the Eighth Quaere no pretences whatsoever I dare not thus stretch my Conscience about an Oath when I know that the Authors were Learned Crasty willing to extend it far enough and Men that understood English and spake in a matter of their own Concernment and Employment Therefore by any pretence whatsoever I cannot think that they meant to exclude so many Pretences as the Eighth Case speaks of 10. Note also That he alloweth Parliaments Judges or private Men even by the King's Authority in his Laws to defend their Lives their Houses Estates Purses and Companions against such as are Commissioned to Surprize them Which is because he taketh such to be really no Commissions And so the Parliament and their Army would say in a Word That the King's Commissions to his Armies were no Commissions But this which the Lawyers wholly rest on I think in my Conscience was so contrary to the Imposers Sense that if it had been then mentioned they would have expresly put in some Words against it And if an illegal Commission be no Commission then there are not two sorts of Commissions one legal and the other illegal unless speaking Equivocally And this comes up to what Richard Hooker and the long Parliament said viz. That the King can do no wrong because if it be wrong it is not to be taken for the King's Act. 11. Note also That a Commission must be shewn if required and an illegal one is null And which of the Parliament's Souldiers ever saw the Commissions of those whom they Fought against Not one of many Thousands And was this think you the meaning of the Imposers of the Oath that it should be left to Men's Liberty to take an illegal Commission for none If this were declared who of all the Parliament's Army would not take this part of the Oath 12. To the Eleventh he answereth That the Oath is against altering Monarchy which none doubts of But whether the Power of Parliaments or Courts of Justice be included the good Man thought it not best to understand 13. He thinks that by Government is meant only the Species Monarchy and not the Person of the King as being sufficiently secured elsewhere whereas there is no such limitation in the Words but that he is to be esteemed a Changer of the Government who would depose the King and set up an Usurper 14. But if it do secure the King's Person as I think it doth and should do he thinks it extendeth not to the Persons of the Church-Governours because by Law they may be altered But 1. Here is no difference made in the Oath unless it be that the Government of the Church is put before that of the State 2. Therefore the Question is Whether this Oath be not contrary to those former Laws and do not settle the Bishops and Chancellors as fast as the King As to the plain Sense of the Words I find no difference And as to the meaning of the Law-makers it is hard otherwise to know it seeing they are of so many minds and various degrees of Capacity among themselves 15. And it is here confessed That the Clergy-Government is included yea and that the Oath meaneth the English Species and yet he thinketh that it prohibiteth not lawful Endeavours to make more Bishops and to take down Lay-Chancellors whereas 1. Chancellors are
Hostility is Disunion and Dissolution Therefore no Head or Soveraign hath power to destroy or sight against his Kingdom nor any Common-wealth or Kingdom against their King or Soveraign Rulers unless in any case the Law of Nature and Nations which is above all Humane Positive Laws should make the dissolution of the Republick to become a Duty As if some Republick should cast off the Essential Principles of Society By Law neither King nor Kingdom may destroy or hurt each other For the Governing Laws suppose their Union as the Constitution and the Common good with the due Welfare of the Soveraign is the end of Government which none have power against But it must be noted that the words are against the King and not against the King's Will for if his Will be against his Welfare his Kingdom or his Laws though that Will be signified by his Commissioners the Declaration disclaimeth not the resisting of such a Will by Arms. 3. And if there be any that assert that the King's Authority giveth them right to take up Arms against his Person or Lawful Commissions it must needs be a False and Traiterous Assertion For if his Person may be Hostilely fought against the Common-wealth may be dissolved which the Law cannot suppose for all Laws die with the Common-wealth And it is a contradiction to be authorized by him to resist by Arms his Commissions which are according to Law For the Authority pretended to be his must be his Laws or Commissions and to be Authorized by his Laws or Commissions to resist his Laws must signifie that his Laws are contradictory when by one we must resist another But so far as they are contradictory both cannot be Laws or Lawful Commissions For one of them must needs nullifie the other either by Fundamental Priority or by Posteriority signifying a Repeal of the other And it must be noted that yet the Trayterous Position medleth not with the Question of taking Arms against the King's Person or Commissioners by the Law of God of Nature or of Nations but only of doing it by his own Authority 4. And that it is not lawful to take Arms against any Commissioned by him according to Law in time of Rebellion and War in pursuance of such Commission is a Truth so evident that no sober Persons can deny it The Long Parliament that had the War did vehemently assert it and therefore gave out their Commissions to the Earl of Essex and his Soldiers to fight against Delinquent Subjects for the King and Parliament 5. And the Oath containeth no more than our not endeavouring to Alter the Protestant Religion established or the King's Government or Monarchy It cannot with any true reason be supposed to tie us at all to the Bishops-much less to the English Disease or Corruption of Episcopacy or to Lay-Chancel lours c. but only to the King as Supreme in all Causes Ecclesiastical and Civil so far as they fall under Coercive Government This is thus proved past denyal 1. The word Protestant Religion as estalished in the Church of England cannot include the Prelacy For 1. The Protestant Religion is essentially nothing but the Christian Religion as such with the disclaiming of Popery aud so our Divines have still professed But our Prelacy is no part of the Christian Religion 2. The Protestant Religion is common to us with many Countreys which have no Prelacy And it is the same Religion with us and them 3. The words of the Oath distinguish the Religion of the Church of England from the Church of England it self and from Government 4. If Episcopacy in general were proved part of the Protestant Religion the English Accidents and Corruptions are not so They that say that Episcopacy is Iure Divino and unalterable do yet say that National and Provincial Churches are Iure Humano and that so is a Diocesane as it is distinct from Parochial containing many Parishes in it And if the King should set up a Bishop in every Market-Town yea every Parish and put down Diocesanes it is no more than what he may do And if by the Protestant Religion established should be meant every alterable mode or circumstance then King-James changed it when he made a new Translation of the Bible and both he and our late Convocation and King and Parliament by their Advice did change it when they added new Forms of Prayer And then this Oath bindeth all from endeavouring to make any alteration in the Liturgie or mend the Translation or the Metre of the Psalms c. or to take the keys of Excommunication and Absolution out of the hands of the Lay-Chancellour's c. which none can reasonably suppose 2. And that our Prelacy is not at all included in the word Government of the Kingdom in Church and State but only the King 's Supreme Government in all Causes Ecclesiastical and Civil is most evident 1. Because it is expressly said The Government of the Kingdom which is all one with the Government of the King For a Bishop or a Justice or a Mayor is no Governour of the Kingdom but only in the Kingdom of a Particular Church City Corporation or Division The summa potestas only is the Government of the Kingdom as a Kingdom And because forma denominat we cannot take the Kingdom to signifie only a Church or City 2. Because else it would change the very constitution of the Kingdom by making all the inferiour Officers unalterable and so to be essential constitutive parts Whereas only the pars Imperans and pars Subdita are constitutive parts of every Kingdom or Republick and the Constitutive pars Imperans is only the summa potestas except where the mixture and fundamental Contract is such as that Inferiour Officers are woven so into the Constitution as that they may not be changed without it's Dissolution which is hardly to be supposed even at Venice Tbe Oaths between the summa potestas and the Subject are the bonds of the Commonwealth their Union being the form that must not be dissolved But to make Oaths of Allegiance or Unchangeableness â—each to the Inferiour Magistrates or Officers is to change the Government or Constitution 3. And so it destroyeth the Regal power in one of it's chief properties or prerogatives which is to alter inferiour Officers who all receive their power from the Supreme and are alterable by him even by the Majestas which hath the Legislative powers And this would take away all the King's power to alter so much as a Mayor Justice or Constable For mark that Government of the Kingdom in Church and State are set equally together without any note of difference as to alteration If therefore it extend to any but the Supreme even to inferiour Officers it were to extend to them as Governing the State even to the lowest as well as the Church But this is a supposition to be Contemned 4. And if the Distinction should be meant de personis Imperantibus and should
were so used before what would they be said they if by such a War they should be conquered And they thought that the ruine of the State and of Men's Propriety was such an End as no means could be lawfully used for and that the Preservation of the Kingdom was such an End as would make lawful any necessary means which God himself had not forbidden 3. And then as to Authority they thought that the Legislative Power is the chiefest part of Soveraignty and that the Parliament having a part in the Legislative Power had so far inherently a Power to defend it which no Law can suppose them to give away And as the Peoples Representatives they supposed themselves much Intrusted to secure their reserved Liberties which the Law giveth not the King any Authority to take away 4. And they supposed that Government being that Publick Work which upholdeth the Common Peace it is to be done by Publick Instruments andâ— Means and that the Kings Laws are his Instruments of Government and also his Publick Courts and Officers And that the Subjects cannot know so well whether private Commands or Commissions be real or counterfeit nor are so much bound to take notice of them And that the Judgments and Executions of the Courts of Justice being the Effect of Laws which King and Parliament have made are of greater Authority than contrary Commissions or Commands from the King alone 5. It much confirmed them because all confessed That the Sheriffs of Counties must raise the posse Comitatus for the Execution of some Decrees of Courts of Justice though the King forbid it or grant a Commission to any to hinder it And that the foresaid Statute of Edw. 3. maketh even the King's Letters under the Broad Seal to be void when they would hinder Justice 6. And they pleaded the Law of Nature which is greater than Positive Laws That no Nation is bound to destroy it self The Militia being nothing but the Peoples own Sword they say they are not bound to destroy themselves with it nor can any Law be so interpreted And whereas it was said That the King sought not to destroy the Parliament but to bring some among them to punishment they said that it belongeth to the Parliament to judge its Members and that if on pretence of punishing offending Members the King may come and fetch away or demand those that displease him Parliaments and Liberties and all Security of them is gone 7. The King's Answer to the Nineteen Propositions greatly confirmed many when they saw the King himself declaring to them That the Legislative Power was in Kings Lords and Commons and that the Government was mixt and was not Arbitrary which they thought it must needs be if his Commissions were of greater power than his Laws and Courts and if no resistance might be made against any that executed an illegal Commission 8. It most prevailed with many that the Parliament professed not to fight against either the Person or Authority of the King though against his Will but that their War was only against Subjects They said that some Subjects were Delinquents that fled from Justice against whom they might raise Arms offensively and other Subjects took Arms against the Parliament and against these they made a Defensive War But all of them were Subjects and not Kings And the King's Will or Commission is not enough to save all Subjects from punishment when his Law is against it nor to authorize them to destroy the Parliament and their Country 9. They were much emboldened because this Parliament was continued by Law till it should dissolve it self And therefore some said the King's Presence is virtually with them he being a part of the Parliament and others said that no War could be lawful which was for their dissolution or ruine or to deprive them of their Liberty and that the defence of them was lawful whom the Law continued 10. They alledged King Iames who they said of any Man did most endeavour to advance his Prerogative and yet in his printed Treatise for Monarchy confesseth That a King cannot lawfully make a War against the Body of his Kingdom but only against an offending Faction Therefore say they not against the Representative Body till it be proved that by perfidiousness they have forfeited the Virtue and Honour of their Representation 11. They alledged Barclay Grotius and other Defenders of Monarchy especially that passage of Grotius de Iure Belli where he saith That if several Persons have a part in the Summa Potestas of which he maketh Legislation a chief Act each part hath naturally the power of defending its own Interest in the Soveraignty against the other part if thâ—â— invade it And addeth over boldly That if in such a War they conquer the conquâ—red party loseth to them his share And saith That this is so true that it holdeth though the Law expresly say that one of the Parties shall have the power of the Militia it being to be understood that he shall have it against Forreign Enemies and Delinquents and not against the other part 12. It much confirmed them to find the most Learned Episcopal Divines speak so high for the Legislative Power of Parliaments as Tho. Hooker doth Eccles. Pol. lib. 1. for the Eighth Book which saith more than the Parliament ever said was not then published And for resistance in several Cases as Bishop Bilson doth even in that Treatise wherein he so strongly defendeth Obedience and which he dedicated to Queen Elizabeth And to find how far they defend the French Dutch and German Protestants Wars 13. They said that the Carnal respect of Men for personal Interests hath made all the stream of most Mens Words and Writings go on the Prince's side but Tyanny is a Mischief as well as Disobedience and that which all Ages and most Nations have grievously smarted by and they that befriend it are guilty of the Sin and of the Ruines which it procureth It keepeth out Christianity from five parts of the World It corrupteth it and keepeth out the Protestant Truth in most of the sixth part The Eastern and the Western Churches suffer under it to the perdition of millions of Souls If Bodily Sufferings were all the matter were nothing but it is Mens Souls and the Interest of the Gospel which is the Sacrifice to their Wills 14. Lastly This greatly confirmed many that the Matter being a Controversie whether the Disobedience and Resistance of King or Parliament is now the Rebellion and Sin the simple People are not wiser than the States-men that differ about it How then should they better quiet their Judgments than in the Judgment of the Parliament who are the Trustees of the People and the chief Court and Council of the King and have so many Lawyers and Wife men among them and are so greatly interessed in the common Good themselves If it were but the Question Which is the King 's Governing Will which the People must obey And a
of the true Religion and the Liberties of the Kingdom otherwise than we did For as they extended the word true Religion further than we did including the Form of Church Government in Scotland so they seem to understand it Conjunctione inseparabili and to prefer the Defence of Religion before the Defence of the King whereas we understood it Conjunctione seperabili and though in meer estimation we preferred Religion before King or Kingdom yet in regard of the Duty of Defence we thought the King must be restored and defended though legally he would have brought in worse than Prelacy Though we did not think that he might do it illegally and therefore that he could not govern Arbitrarily nor take away the Peoples fore-prized Propriety or Liberty nor change the Form of the Government of the Commonwealth But those that thought otherwise said That there is no power but from God and therefore none against him or above him and therefore none against or above his Laws which how true soever seemeth not at all to decide our Case For though it follow never so much that such Acts against God are not Acts of Authority yet the same Person that hath not Authority to do this may have Authority in other matters and may be our rightful Governour and therefore must be obeyed in all things lawful though not in this and his Person defended And therefore how they could refuse to receive the King till he consented to take the Covenant I know not unless the taking of the Covenant had been a Condition on which he was to receive his Crown by the Laws or Fundamental Constitution of the Kingdom which none pretendeth Nor know I by what power they can add any thing to the Coronation Oath or Covenant which by his Ancestors was to be taken without his own Consent But in their Zeal for the Church the Scots did cause the King when he was come over to them not only mutat is mutandis to take the Covenant but also to publish a Declaration to the World that he did it voluntarily and heartily and that he lamented the Sins of his Father's House acknowledging the Guilt of the Blood of the late Wars c. In all which it seemed to me and many others that they miscarried divers ways 1. In imposing Laws upon their King for which they had no Authority 2. In forcing him to dishonour the Memory of his Father by such Consessions 3. In tempting him to speak and publish that which they might easily know was contrary to his heart and so to take God's Name in vain 4. And in giving Cromwell occasion to charge them all with dissimulation § 103. What Transactions there were between the King and the Scots for the Expediting of his Coronation and what Preparations were made for an Army to defend him and what Differences among the Parties hereabouts I shall not describe there being enow of them that were upon the place who can do it better But to return to England as soon as they understood what the Scots had done the Sectaries in England reproached them as Fools and Hypocrites that by such a Pageantry mockt themselves and would make the People believe that the King was turned Presbyterian and was a Cordial Covenanter when they had forced him to say and do that which they might well know he did abhor And they presently resolve to invade the Scots to keep them from invading England and not to stay till they came in upon this Land as heretofore So that Cromwell is in Scotland with his Army before they were well setled in their Affairs This much increased the alienation of the Peoples hearts from the Cromwellians for though they might suppose that the Scots intended to bring the King into England yet few believed that he might begin with them by an Invasion it being too much to have resisted them at home § 104. When the Soldiers were going against the King and Scots I wrote Letters to some of them to tell them of their Sin and desired them at last to begin to know themselves it being those same men that have so much boasted of Love to all the Godly and pleaded for tender dealing with them and condemned those that persecuted them or restrained their Liberty who are now ready to imbrue their Swords in the Blood of such as they acknowledge to be Godly and all because they dare not be perjured or disloyal as they are Some of them were startled at these Letters and O blindness thought me an uncharitable Censurer that would say that they could kill the Godly even when they were on their march to do it For how bad soever they spake of the Cavaliers and not without too much desert as to their Morals they confessed that abundance of the Scots were godly Men. And afterward those that I wrote to better understood me § 105. At the same time the Rump or Commonwealth who so much abhorred Persecution and were for Liberty of Conscience made an Order that all Ministers should keep their days of Humiliation to fast and pray for their Success in Scotland and that we should keep their Days of Thanksgiving for their Victories and this upon pain of Sequestration so that we all expected to be turned out but they did not execute it upon any save one in our parts For my part instead of praying and preaching for them when any of the Committee or Soldiers were my hearers I laboured to help them to understand what a Crime it was to force men to pray for the Success of those that were violating their Covenant and Loyalty and going in such a Cause to kill their Brethren And what it was to force Men to give God thanks for all their Bloodshed and to make God's Ministers and Ordinances vile and serviceable to such Crimes by forcing Men to run to God on such Errands of Blood and Ruine And what it is to be such Hypocrites as to persecute and cast out those that preach the Gospel while they pretend the advancement of the Gospel and the liberty of tender Consciences And what a means it was to debauch all Consciences and leave neither tenderness nor honesty in the World when the Guides of the Flocks and Preachers of the Gospel shall be noted to swallow down such heinous Sins My own Hearers were all satisfied with my Doctrine but the Committee Men look sowre but let me alone And the Soldiers said I was so like to Love that I would not be right till I was shorter by the Head Yet none of them ever medled with me farther than by the Tongue nor was I ever by any of them in those times forbidden or hindered to preach one Sermon except only one Assize-Sermon which the High Sheriff had desired me to preach and afterward sent me word to â—orbear as from the Committee saying That by Mr. Moor's means the Independent Preacher at the Colledge the Committee told him that they desired me to forbear and not
Lives zealously and constantly continue therein against all Opposition and promote the same according to our power against all Lets and Impediments whatsoever And that we are not able our selves to suppress or overcome we shall reveal and make known that it may be timely prevented or removed All which we shall do as in the sight of God And because these Kingdoms are guilty of many Sins and Provocations against God and his Son Iesus Christ as is too manifest by our present Distresses and Dangers the Fruits thereof We profess and declare before God and the World our unfeigned desire to be humbled for our own Sins and for the Sins of these Kingdoms especially that we have not as we ought valued the inestimable benefit of the Gospel that we have not laboured for the purity and power thereof and that we have not endeavoured to receive Christ in our hearts nor to walk worthy of him in our lives which are the Causes of other Sins and Transgressions so much abounding amongst us And our true and unfeigned purpose desire and endeavour for our selves and all others under our power and charge both in publick and in private in all Duties we owe to God and Man to amend our Lives and each one to go before another in the Example of a real Reformation That the Lord may turn away his Wrath and heavy Indignation and establish these Churches and Kingdoms in Truth and Peace And this Covenant we make in the presence of Almighty God the Searcher of all hearts with a true intention to perform the same as we shall answer at that great Day when the Secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed Most humbly beseeching the Lord to strengthen us by his Holy Spirit for this end and to bless our Desires and Proceedings with such Success as may be Deliverance and Safety to his People and encouragement to other Christian Churches groaning under or in danger of the Yoke of Antichristian Tyranny to ioyn in the same or like Association and Covenant to the Glory of God the Inlargement of the Kingdom of Iesus Christ and the Peace and Tranquility of Christian Kingdoms and Common-wealths The Oath and Declaration imposed upon the Lay-Conformists in the Corporation Act the Vestry Act c. are as followeth The Oath to be taken I. A. B. do declare and believe That it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take up Arms against the King and that I do abhor that Traiterous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissioned by him So help me God The Declaration to be Subscribed I. A. B. do declare That I hold there lyes no Obligation upon me or any ot her Person from the Oath commonly called The Solemn League and Covenant and that the same was in it self an unlawful Oath and imposed upon the Subjects of this Realm against the known Laws and Liberties of this Kingdom All Vestry Men to make and Subscribe the Declaration following I. A. B. do declare That it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King and that I do abhor that Traiterous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissioned by him And that I will Conform to the Liturgy of the Church of England as it is now by Law established And I do declare That I do hold there lyes no Obligation upon me or any other Person from the Oath commonly called The Solemn League and Covenant to indeavour any Change or Alteration of Government either in Church or State and that the same was in it self an unlawful Oath and imposed upon the Subjects of this Realm against the known Laws and Liberties of this Kingdom The Declaration thus Prefaced in the Act of Uniformity Every Minister after such reading thereof shall openly and publickly before the Congregation there assembled declare his unfeigned Assent and Consent to the use of all things in the said Book contained and prescribed in these words and no other I. A. B. do here declare my unfeigned Assent and Consent to all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book Instituted The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church according to the use of the Church of England together with the Psalter or Psalms of David pointed as they are to be sung or said in Churches and the Forms or Manner of Making Ordaining and Consecrating of Bishops Priests and Deacons The Declaration to be Subscribed I. A. B. d◠declare That it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King and that I abhor that Trayterous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissionated by him and that I will Conform to the Liturgy of the Church of England as it is now by Law established And I do declare that I do hold there lyes no Obligation upon me or any other Person from the Oath commonly called The Solemn League and Covenant to endeavour any Change or Alteration of Government either in Church or State and that the same was in it self a◠unlawful Oath and imposed upon the Subjects of this Realm against the known Laws and Liberties of this Kingdom The Oath of Canonical Obedience EGo A. B. Iuro quod praestabo Veram Canonicam Obedientiam Episcopo Londinens◠ejusque Successoribus in omnibus licitis honestis § 302. II. The Nonconformists who take not this Declaration Oath Subscription c. are of divers sorts some being further distant from Conformity than others some thinking that some of the forementioned things are lawful and some that none of them are lawful and all have not the same Reasons for their dissent But all are agreed that it is not lawful to do all that is required and therefore they are all cast out of the Exercise of the Sacred Ministry and forbidden to preach the Word of God § 303. The Reasons commonly given by them are either 1. Against the Imposing of the things forementioned or 2. Against the Using of them being imposed Those of the former sort were given into the King and Bishops before the Passing of the Act of Uniformity and are laid down in the beginning of this Book and the Opportunity being now past the Nonconformists now meddle not with that part of the Cause it having seemed good to their Superiours to go against their Reasons But this is worthy the noting by the way that all that I can speak with of the Conforming Party do now justifie only the Using and Obeying and not the Imposing of these things with the Penalty by which they are Imposed From whence it is evident that most of their own Party do now justifie our Cause which we maintained at the Savoy which was against this Imposition whilst it might have been prevented and for which such an intemperate Fury hath
those Vices which are the shame of Infidels and Heathens and those of our Communion are in their Lives no better than the Unbelieving World All Men will think that that is the best Society which hath the best People and will judge rather by Mens Lives than their Opinions § 345. 7. And hereby it greatly dishonoureth Christianity it self and when the Church is as full of Vices as the Mahomiran Societies are or the Heathen it is a publick perswading the World that our Religion is as false or bad as theirs § 346. 8. And hereby God himself and our blessed Redeemer are greatly dishonoured in the World As his Saints are his honour so when the Communion of Atheists and Prophane Persons and Oppressors and Deceivers and Fornicators and Drunkards is called by us The Communion of Saints it tendeth to make the Church a Scorn and to the great dishonour of the Head of such a Body and the Author of the Christian Faith § 347. 9. And it lamentably conduceth to the hardening of the Heathens and Infidels of the World and hindering their Conversion to the Christian Faith It would make a Believer's heart to bleed if any thing in all the World will do it to think that five parts in six of the World are still Heathens Mahometans and Infidels and that the wicked Lives of Christians with Popperies Ignorance and Divisions is the great Impediment to their Conversion To read and hear Travellers and Merchants tell that the Banians and other Heathens in Indostan Cambaia and many other Lands and the Mahometans adjoyning to the Greeks and the Abassines c. do commonly fly from Christianity as the Separatists among us do from Prelacy and say God will not save us if we be Christians for Christians are Drunkards and proud and Deceivers c. And that the Mahometans and many Heathens have more both of Devotion and Honesty than the common fort of Christians have that live among them O wretched Christians that are not content to damn themselves but thus lay stumbling blocks before the World It were better for these men that they had never been born But if all these notorious ones were disowned by the Churches it would quit our Profession much from the dishonour and shew poor Infidels that our Religion is good though their Lives be bad § 348. 10. Lastly it galleth the Consciences of the Ministers in their administrations of the Sacraments to the openly ungodly and grosly ignorant It hindereth the Comfort of the Church in its Communion It filleth the Heads of poor Christians with Scruples and their Hearts with Fears and is the great cause of unavoidable Separations among us and consequently of all the Censures on one side and wrathful Penalties on the other and uncharitableness on both sides which follow thereupon If the Pastors will not differ between the precious and the vile by necessary regular Discipline tender Christians will be tempted to difference by irregular Separations and to think as Cyprian saith That it belongeth to the People to forsake a sinful Pastor They will separate further than they ought and will take our Churches as Sinks of Pollution and fly from the noisomness of them and come out from among us for fear of partaking in our Plagues as men run out of a ruinous House lest it fall upon their Heads And then they will fall into Sects among themselves and fall under the hot displeasure of the Bishops and then they will be reproached and vexed as Schismaticks while they reproach our Churches as Hypocritical and Prophane that call such Societies the Communion of Saints This hath been and this is and this will be the Cause of Separations Sects Persecutions Malice and Ruins in the Christian World And it will never be cured till some tolerable Discipline cure the Churches § 349. 10. The tenth and last Charge against our Frame of Prelacy is That by is use of Civil or Coercive Power it at once breaketh the Command of Christ and greatly injureth the Civil Government Both which are thus proved by the Nonconformists § 350. 1. It violateth all these Laws of Christ Luke 22. 24 25. And there was a strife among them which of them should be accounted the greatest And he said unto them the Kings of the Gentles exercise Lordship over them and they that exercise Authority upon them are called Benefactors but ye shall not be so but he that is greatest among you let him be as the younger and he that is chief as he that doth serve That is it is a Ministerial Dignity and not a Magistratical which you are called to that which is allowed to Kings here is denied to Ministers even Apostles But it is not Tyranny or Abuse of Power but Secular Magistratical Power it self which is all owed to Kings Ergo it is this which is forbidden Ministers This is the very sence of the Text which is given by Protestant Episcopal Divines themselves when they reject the Presbyterians sence who say that it forbiddeth Ecclesiastical Superiority and Power of one Minister over another as well as Coercive Therefore the old Rhymer said against the Prelates Christus dixit quodam loco Vos non sic nec dixit joco Dixit suis Ergo isti Cujus sunt non certo Christi So 1. Pet. 5. 1 2 3. Feed the Flock of God which is among you taking the oversight thereof not by constraint but willingly Not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind Neither as being Lords over God's heritage but being ensamples to the Flock But our Bishops take the oversight of those that are not among them and whom they feed not and they rule them by constraint and not as voluntary Subjects not by Ensample for one of an hundred never seeth or knoweth them but as Lords by Secular Force Dr. Hammond taketh the word Constraint here Actively not Passively not as forbidding them to Bishops against their own Wills but to Rule the People by constraint against the Peoples wills It would be tedious to recite all those Texts which command the People to imitate the Apostles as they imitated Christ who never used Magistratical force nor did any of his Apostles and say that the Weapons of our warfare are not carnals and that he that warreth entangleth not himself with the Affairs of this Life and that the Servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle c. § 351. 2. And that this Coercive Church Government is an heinous Injury to Christian Magistrates even where it seemeth to be subordinate to them appeareth thus 1. Though they do mostly confess that they can exercise no Power of Coercion of themselves but by the Magistrates consent yet do they take it to be the Magistrates duty to consent to it as if he were not else a tender Nursing Father to the Church and so they lay his Conscience in Prison till he trust them with his Sword or serve them by it 2. They call their Magistratical Government by the
skill in Laws than they 12. They find that even the greatest Episcopal Divines approved by our Princes and most Learned Defenders of Monarchy and Obedience do yet set up the Laws above the King and write more in this Case than we can consent to◠Mr. Tho. Hooker whom King Charles the First commended to his Children to be read speaketh so very high not only in his whole Eighth Book dedicated by Bishop Gauden to the King but also in his First Book which was extant when King Charles the First commended his Works that for my part I do not believe him that the Body as such hath the Legislative Power and that the King is singulis major and universis minor with much of the like And therefore I have wrote a full Confutation of him in the Fourth Tome of my Christian Directory And yet he is one of the most magnified Authours with the Bishops And so is Bishop Bilson who in his Treatise for Christian Subjection dedicated to Queen Elizabeth hath that terrible passage for resisting Kings before-recited § 253. 13. And they find that not only Politicians speak more in this Case than we allow and the Roman Greek and other Historians but the Historians and Chroniclers of this Land For instance Hollingshead Lib. 1. in his Chapter of Parliaments saith This House hath the most high and absolute Power of the Realm For thereby Kings and mighty Princes have from time to time been deposed from their Thrones Laws either enacted or abrogated Offenders of all sorts punished and corrupted Religion either disannulled or reformed which commonly is divided into two Houses or Parts c. Here is more then I assent to or think to be justifiable Now when all these say so much more for Resistance than we judge sound it seemeth hard to us to go so far contrary to them all in Matters of other Mens Profession as to Subscribe That on no pretence whatsoever no one Commissionated by the King may be resisted by taking up Arms. 14. And we read how Dr. Mainwairing and other Divines have been condemned by Parliament for Matters of this Nature And whatever any Latitudinarian may say we are sure that on no pretence whatsoever are words that exclude all these fore-mentioned Pretences from being lawful And if it yet be said That it is disloyal to suppose that any such illegal Commission will be granted we do not suppose that it will be so but if it be not possible to be so in this Age or another then we are contented to Subscribe this Clause For Parliaments will not differ about Impossibilities § 395. Incident to this Controversie are other Clauses of the Declaration as that the Covenant was in it self an unlawful Oath and imposed against the known Laws c. which though they contradict not yet many that were Children then and know neither Matter of Law or Fact no not so much as the Fundamental Laws and Constitution of the Kingdom do think themselves very uncapable of determining § 396. And for the Trayterous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissionated by him We see no position here recited and therefore must annex this Clause to the former as before supposing that the meaning is that it is a Trayterous Position to say That it is lawful by the King's Authority to take up Arms on any pretence whatsoever against c. And we all confess that it is a Contradictory and Trayterous Position for any man to say that he may take up Arms by the King's Authority against his Authority or Dignity or Honour or Person But all the Doubt is as aforesaid Whether the King's Laws have not his Authority and whether his Laws and his Commission may not be contrary or one Commission contrary to another And in that case whether it be Trayterous to say that one side hath his Authority against the other As if his Law allow Men to defend their Lives and Purses against Assaults and an Assailant produce a Commission whether the King's Authority in his Laws and Courts enable not a Man by Arms to save his Purse or Life against such a pretended Commissioner And how shall any Subject at the time of the Assault be sure whether the Commission be true or spurious If as Ioa◠and Abner sent the young Men to play mad play before them and the Romans caused their Gladiators to fight to make them sport so if the King to try the Valour of some Subjects would Commission a few on both sides to fight against each other doth it follow that both sides were Traytors because they both fought by his Authority against such as were Commissionated by him If it be said That this is not the meaning of the Act we answer◠That where Forms are supposed to be deliberately worded by a Parliament if we must not understand Universals universally but may put in Limitations or Exceptions at our Pleasure then their words are not the signifiers of their Minds and we know not whether to go to understand them nor what be the Exceptions and Limitations allowed but every Man may except according to his Fancy and thus all will be but Equivocation and Deceit And Dr. Sanderson resolveth it That when Oaths and consequently subscribed Forms are ambiguously worded and the Imposers will not explain them it is not fit at all to take them Some Lawyers tell me that if it came before the Judges they would judge an unlawful Commission to be no Commission and that the Judges are the Expositors of the Law I answer 1. We have no assurance that the Judges would so judge much less unanimously nor that they have so done 2. Lately Mr. Ioseph Read offered at the King's-Bench-Bar to take the Oxford Oath as expounded in that sence by the Vote of the Lords about the Test and he was reproved for his Offer and told that he must take it as the Law imposed it and was sent back to Jail 3. The Law-makers only can expound a Law as antecedently Obligatory to all the Subjects The Judges can only expound it consequently for the decision of a particular Case in order to Execution and ad hoc which warranteth no Man to take that for the true meaning of the Statute § 397. IV. The Fourth Controversie is about the Oath of Canonical Obedience And the Reasons why this is scrupled by the Non-Conformists are these Because they take the Power it self to which they are to swear to be specifically Evil and against the Word of God of which their Proofs are given before And therefore they dare not be guilty of swearing Obedience to them lest they 1. Take the Name of God in vain and Oath being a thing which is not to be ventured on but with the greatest reverence deliberation and sincerity 2. And lest they scandalously approve of Usurpation in Christ's Kingdom to the wrong of his Crown and Dignity and contract the guilt of Treason or Disloyalty
as that the Bishop of the lowest degree instead of ruling one Church with the Presbyters ruleth many hundred Churches by Lay-Chancellors who use the Keys of Excommunication and Absolution c. And they take it for an Act of Rebellion against God if they should Swear never to do the Duty which he commandeth and so great a Duty as Church-Reformation in so great a Matter If it were but never to pray or never to amend a fault in themselves they durst not Swear it 12. This Oath seemeth to be the same in Sence with the Et caetora Oath in the Canons of 1640. That we will never consent to an alteration of the Government by Arch-Bishops Bishops Deans c. And one Parliament voted down that and laid a heavy charge upon it which no Parliament since hath taken off 13. As the National Vow and Covenant seemeth a great Snare to hinder the Union of the Church among us in that it layeth our Union on an exclusion of Prelacy and so excludeth all those learned worthy Men from our Union who cannot consent to that Exclusion so the laying of the Kingdoms and Churches Union upon the English Prelacy and Church-Government so as to exclude all that cannot consent to it doth seem as sure an Engine of Division We think that if our Union be centered but in Christ the King of all and in the King as his Officer and our Soveraign under him it may be easie and sure But if we must all unite in the English Frame of Prelacy we must never Unite § 15. Those that take the Oath do as those that Subscribe resolve that they will understand it in a lawful Sense be it true or false and so to take it in that Sense To which end they say that nullum iniquum est in Lege praesumendum and that all publick Impositions must be taken in the best Sense that the Words will bear And by force and stretching what words may not be well interpreted But the Nonconformists go on other grounds and think that about Oaths Men must deal plainly and sincerely and neither stretch their Consciences nor the Words nor interpret universal Terms particularly but according to the true meaning of the Law-givers as far as they can understand it and where they cannot according to the proper and usual signification of the Words And the Parliament themselves tell us That this is the true Rule of interpreting their Words Beyond which therefore we dare not stretch them § 16. And therefore 14. They dare not take the Oath because if it be not to be taken in the proper or ordinary Sense of the Words then they are sure that they cannot understand it for it doth not please the Parliament to expound it And Oaths must be taken in Truth Judgment and Righteousness and not ignoranatly when we know that we understand them not § 17. The Lawyers even the honestest are commonly for a more stretching Exposition And those that speak out say That an illegal Commission is none at all But we our selves go further than this would leads us for we judge That even an illegally commissioned Person is not to be resisted by Arms except in such Cases as the Law of Nature or the King himself by his Laws or by a contrary Commission alloweth us to resist him But if Commissions should be contradictory to each other or to the Law we know not what to Swear in such a case § 18. But because much of the Case may be seen in these following Questions which upon the coming out of that Act I put to an able worthy and sincere Friend with his Answers to them I will here Insert them viz. Serjeant Fountain Queries upon the Oxford Oath We presuppose it commonly resolved by Casuists in Theology from the Law of Nature and Scripture 1. That Perjury is a Sin and so great a Sin as tendeth to the ruin of the Peace of Kingdoms the Life of Kings and the Safety of Mens Souls and to make Men unfit for Humane Society Trust or Converse till it be repented of 2. That he that Sweareth contrary to his Iudgment is Perjured though the thing prove true 3. That we must take an Oath in the Imposer's Sense as near as we can know it if he be our Lawful Governour 4. That an Oath is to be taken sensu strictiore and in the Sense of the Rulers Imposing it if that be known if not by the Words interpreted according to the common use of Men of that Profession about that subject And Vniversals are not to be interpreted as Particulars nor must we limit them and distinguish without very good proof 5. That where the Sense is doubtful we are first to ask which is the probable Sense before we ask which is is the best and charitablest Sense and must not take them in the best Sense when another is more probable to be the true Sense Because it is the Truth and not the Goodness which the Vnderstanding first considereth Otherwise any Oath almost imaginable might be taken there being few Words so bad which are not so ambiguous as to bear a good Sense by a forced Interpretation And Subjects must not cheat their Rulers by seeming to do what they do not 6. But when both Senses are equally doubtful we ought in Charity to take the best 7. If after all Means faithfully used to know our Rulers Sense our own Vnderstandings much more incline to think one to be their meaning than the other we must not go against our Vnderstandings 8. That we are to suppose our Rulers fallible and that it 's possible their decrees may be contrary to the Law of God but not to suspect them without plain cause These things supposed we humbly crave the Resolution of these Questions about the present Oath and the Law Qu. 1. Whether upon any pretence whatsoever refer not to any Commissionated by him as well as to the King himself 2. Whether not lawful extendeth only to the Law of the Land or also to the Law of God in Nature 3. Whether I Swear that it is not lawful do not express my peremptory certain Determination and be not more than I Swear that in my Opinion it is not lawful 4. What is the Traytorous Position here meant for here is only a Subject without a Praedicate which is no Position at all and is capable of various Praedicates 5. If the King by Act of Parliament commit the Trust of his Navy Garrison or Militia to one durante vita and should Commissionate another by force to eject him whether both have not the King's Authority or which 6. If the Sheriff raise the Posse Commitatus to suppress a Riot or to execute the Decrees of the Courts of Justice and fight with any Commissioned to resist him and shall keep up that Power while the Commissioned Persons keep up theirs which of them is to be judged by the Subjects to have the King's Authority 7. If a Parliament or a
Court of Justice declare That the King by his Laws commandeth us to assist the Sheriffs and Justices notwithstanding any Commission to the contrary under the great or little Seal and one shew us a Commission to the contrary which must we take for the King's Authority 8. Whether this extendeth to the Case of King Iohn who delivered the Kingdom to the Pope Or to those Instances of Bilson Barcley Grotius c. of changing the Government putting by the true Heir to whom we are Sworn in the Oath of Allegiance c. if Subjects pretend Commission for such Acts 9. Whether Parliament Judges in Court or private Men may by the King's Authority in his Laws defend their Lives against any that by a pretended Commission invadeth them or their Purses Houses or Companions 10. Whether we must take every Affirmer to have a Commission if he shew it not Or every shewn Commission to be current and not surreptitious though contrary to Law 11. Whether he violateth not this Oath who should endeavour to alter so much of the Legislative Power as is in the Parliament or the Executive in the Established Courts of Justice Or is it meant only of Monarchy as such 12. Doth he not break this Oath who should endeavour to change the Person Governing as well as he that would change the Form of Government 13. If so doth it not also tye us to the Persons of Church-Governours seeing they are equally here twisted and Church-Government preposed 14. Is it the King 's Coercive Government of the Church by the Sword which is here meant according to the Oath of Supremacy Or Spiritual Government by the Keys Or both 15. Is it not the English Form of Church-Government by Diocesans that is here meant and not some other sort of Episcopacy which is not here And doth he not break this Oath who instead of a Bishop over 500 or 1000 Churches without any inferiour Bishop should endeavour to set up a Bishop in every great Church or Market-Town or as many as the Work requireth 16. Seeing Excommunication and Absolution are the notable parts of Spiritual Government and it is not only the Actions but the Actors or Governours that we Swear not to alter and Lay-Chancellors are the common Actors or Governours whether an endeavour to alter Lay-Chancellors Government as some did that procured his Majesty's Declaration concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs be not contrary to this Oath and excluded by any alteration 17. Whether petitioning or other peaceable means before allowed by Law be not any endeavour and a violation of this Oath 18. Whether not at any time c. tye us not to disobey the King if he should command us by Consultation or Conference to endeavour it Or if the Law be changed doth not this Oath still bind us Lastly Whether this following Sense in which we could take it be the true sense of the Oath I A B do Swear That a it is not Lawful upon any pretence whatsoever b to take up Arms against the King c And that I do abhor that Traytorous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissionated by him d in pursuance of such Commission And that I will not at any time endeavour any alteration of Government either in Church or State e a In my Opinion b For the Subjects of his Majesty's Dominions c Either his Authority or his Person the Law forbidding both d Whether it be his Parliament Courts of Justice Legal Officers or any other Persons authorized by his publick Laws or his Commission supposing that no contrariety of Laws and Commissions by over-sight or otherwise do Arm the Subjects against each other e I will not endeavour any alteration of State-Government at all either as to the Person of the King or the Species of Government either as to the Legislative or Executive Power as in the King himself or his Parliament or Established Courts of Justice And therefore I declare That I take all the rest of this Oath only in a Sense consistent with this Clause implying no alteration in the Government And I will endeavour no alteration of the Coercive Government of the Church as it is in the King according to the Oath of Supremacy Nor any alienation of the Spiritual Power of the Keys from the Lawful Bishops and Pastors of the Church Nor will I endeavour to restore the Ancient Discipline by removing the Spiritual Government by the Keys out of the Hands of Lay-Chancellors into the Hands of so many able Pastors as the number of Churches and necessity of the work requireth nor any other Reformation of the Church by any Rebellious Schismatical or other unlawful means whatsoever nor do I believe that any Vow or Covenant obligeth me thereto declaring notwithstanding that it 's none of my meaning to bind my self from any Lawful Means of such Reformation nor to disobey the King if at any time He command me to endeavour the Alteration of any thing justly alterable The General Answer was as followeth UPon Serious Consideration of the Act of Parliament Entitled An Act for Restraining of Nonconformists from Inhabiting in Corporations And of the Oath therein mentioned I am of Opinion That there is nothing contained in that Oath according to the true Sense thereof But that it is not Lawful to take up Arms against the King or any Authorised by his Commission or for a private Person to endeavour the Alteration of the Monarchical Government in the State or the Government by Bishops in the Church And that any Person notwithstanding the taking of such Oath if he apprehend that the Lay-Judges in Bishop's Courts as to Sentence of Excommunication for Matters meerly Ecclesiastical or for any other Cause ought to be Reformed or that Bishopricks are of too large extent may safely Petition or use any lawful Endeavour for Reformation of the same For that such Petition or other Lawful Endeavour doth not tend to the Alteration of the Government but to the amendment of what shall be found amiss in the Government and Reformed by Lawful Authority and thereby the Government better Established And I conceive every Exposition of the said Oath upon Supposition or Presumption of an Obligation thereby to any thing which is contrary to the Law of God or the Kingdom is an illegal and a forced Exposition contrary to the intent and meaning of the said Oath and Act of Parliament for it is a Rule nullum iniquum est in Lege praesumendium And an Exposition tending to enjoyn any thing contrary to the Law of God would make the Act of Parliament void which ought not to be admitted when it bears a fair and plain Sense which is no more Than that Subjects ought not to take up Arms against their Lawful King or such as lawfully Commissionated by him and for private Persons to be unquiet in the place wherein they live to the disturbance of the Government in Church or State Iohn Fountain Feb. 6.
1665. The Particular Answer was as followeth NOT at present to dispute the things presupposed although I may not grant all in the Fourth and some other of the Positions to be warranted by the Law of Nature or Scripture I add as necessary to the Resolving of the Questions upon the Act of Parliament That in the Exposition of Acts of Parliament if there may be a fair and reasonable Construction made of the Words not contrary to the Law of God or Reason that Construction ought to be made thereof and that any Exposition which tends to make it sensless or contrary to the Law of God and Reason or to suppose any wicked thing enjoyned thereby is a forced Construction and contrary to Law being destructive to the very Act of Parliament I hereupon lay aside any Answer to the Fourth and Eighth Questions which may peradventure be thought meer Cavils against the Act though I knowing the Temper of the Propounder have a more charitable Opinion of him But I do apprehend that tho' there may want a Word to make a Logical Position concerning the Trayterous Position mentioned in the Oath yet there is a plain Sense in the Oath viz. That it is unlawful to take up Arms against the King and that if any would make a distinction and affirm That though the unlawfulness were admitted to take up Arms against him yet by his Authority they might take up Arms against his Person or against those that are Commissioned by him in pursuance of such Commission such an Affirmation and Position as this is Traytorous and to be abhorred and there is such a plain Sense in it as every one that hath common Reason understands it so and therefore Quod necessario subintelligitur non deest And I do not believe that any who propound the Questions to be resolved do themselves imagine that the Parliament had any thought of what is mentioned in the Eighth Question for nullum iniquum in Lege praesumendum Upon consideration of the Act I apprehend the Makers thereof had an apprehension that there were three sorts of People which might have a dangerous influence upon the King's Subjects if not rightly principled viz. Ministers or Preachers School-Masters and such as did Table and Board Children and therefore did provide to restrain them from doing hurt to the Kingdom in keeping the Ministers out of the populous Places of the Kingdom or where they were best known and most likely to prevail and that no Children might be poisoned with Principles destructive to Government The Principles which they feared were these 1. That in some Cases it might be lawful to take up Arms against the Supreme Magistrate at least by a distinction unwarrantable in taking up Arms against his Authority against his Person or such as he did Commissionate 2. That private Persons might endeavour to alter the Government in the Church or State where they lived For the discovery of such as were of these dangerous Principles I conceive the Oath is framed which is Established by this Act and any who holdeth these Principles may not safely take it but if he hold not these Principles he may And as to the Questions 1. That the Words upon any pretence whatsoever in the Oath refer only to the King himself 2. That Lawful comprehends any Law obligatory 3. That it is only according to the Opinion and Judgment of him that takes it 5. He that hath the Lawful Commission is the only Person that hath Authority by the King's Commission 6. I conceive the Sheriff 7. That Commission which is according to Law 9. I conceive they may 10. I conceive a Commission must be shewn if required and that a surreptitious and void Commission contrary to Law is no Commission at all 11. I understand not the Latitude of this Question but I conceive the Sense of the Oath is not to endeavour the Alteration of Monarchical Government in the State 12. Though I conceive it utterly unlawful to endeavour to change the Person of the Governour yet that being sufficiently provided against by the former Laws I do not conceive that it was intended by the Makers of the Law in this part of the Oath to intend more than the Alteration of the Government 13. Answered before And yet if the Person of the Supreme were included in the State-Government I do not conceive that it would extend to the Governours under him in the Church for they may be justly removed in Case of Crime c. 14. I conceive both 15. I conceive its the English Form of Church-Government and yet that is no breach of the Oath to endeavour in a lawful way to make more Bishops and lesser Bishopricks 16. I do not think the Oath bindeth not to endeavour to alter the Actors or Governours in the Church so it be done by lawful means and that it is lawful notwithstanding the Oath to endeavour to alter Lay-Chancellors in a lawful way 17. I conceive it is not 18. I conceive it doth not There are so many things put in the last Question of the Sense of the Oath as will require more discussion than the present Opportunity admits Iohn Fountain Feb. 13. 1665. Sir Iohn Maymard also told me That an illegal Commission is no Commission though privately being the King's Serjeant §19 But that all these Answers should rather resolve me not to take this Oath than any way satisfie me to take it may thus appear 1. He confesseth that the Principle feared was That in some Cases it is lawful to take up Arms against the Supreme Magistrate or by his Authority against those Commissioned by him And yet implicitly granteth it in the Cases intimated in the Eighth Question 2. He confesseth that another feared Principle was That private Persons may endeavour to alter the Government of the Church And he confesseth That by lawful means we may endeavour it in a great part of it And as to the Particulars 1. He thinketh that the Words on any pretence whatsoever refer to the King only whereas in my Conscience I think that the Authors of the Oath meant it also as to any Commissioned by him otherwise there is nothing in all this Oath against taking Arms against any Commissioned by the King so they do not pretend his own Authority for it And upon my knowledge a great part of those that Fought for the Parliament went on other grounds some thinking Parliaments and People above the King as being singulis Major universis Minor as Hooker speaks Eccles. Pol. Lib. 8. some thinking that the Law of Nature did warrant them and some that the Scripture did require them to do what they did And can I believe that it was none of the Imposers Intention by the Oath to provide against any of these Opinions If really it were not then a Man that taketh this Oath may notwithstanding it believe That though it be not lawful to take Arms against the King nor against his Armies by pretence of his
alter it and the King's Approbation of these Canons made them sufficiently obligatory unto us Those that were against it said I. That Episcopacy was either contra jus Divinum or at best not Iure Divino and therefore mutable when the King and Parliament pleased 2. Or at least that it was undeniable That Archbishops and Deans and Chapters and Arch-deacons c. were not all Iure Divino nay that the English frame of Diocesans having many hundred Parish Churches under one Bishop in fini gradus was not only against the Word of God but destructive of all the Episcopacy which was known in the Church at least for 200 years 3. They said that it was intolerable to swear to a blind Et caetera for litterally it included all the Officers of the Ecclesiastical Courts that are now in Exercise of the Government Lay-Chancellors that use the Keys for Excommunication and Absolution Surrogates Commissaries Officials and the rest And was it ever known that all the Clergy was sworn to such an Anomalous Rabble 4. They said that for ought they knew this Goverment in whole or in some part might be altered by the King and Parliament by a Law And to tie up our selves by an Oath that we would never obey such a Law nor consent to that which the King might command us this they thought was a Bond of Disobedience next to a Rebellion 5. They said that it was against the Subjects Liberty which alloweth them soberly to Petition the King and Parliament for a Redress of any Grievance And if now a Lay-Chancellor's use of the Keys e. g. were no burden to the People we know not how God may make such Alterations by his Providence as may make that a Grievance which now is none 6. And they said it was against the Priviledges of Parliament that such an Oath should be devised and imposed upon the Subjects without a Law or the Parliaments consent These and other Reasons were pleaded against it And afterward when the Parliament took it into consideration it was Condemned on these and other Accounts The Ministers of the Country met together at Bridgnorth to Debate this Business that they might have no Division and some few were for the Oath but more against it This put me upon deeper Thoughts of the Point of Episcopacy and of the English frame of Church-Government than ever I had before and now I had the opportunity of seeing some Books which I never had before My very dear Friend Mr. William Rowley a Gentleman of Shrewsbury sent me Gersomus Bucerus his Dissertatio de Gubernatione Ecclesiae and Didoclaves Altare Damascenum and shortly after I had Parker de Polit. Eccles◠and Baynes's Diocesanes Trial and I received Bishop Downham and compared his Reasons with Bucers Didoclaves c. And though I found not sufficient Evidence to prove all kind of Episcopacy unlawful yet I was much satisfied that the English Diocesan frame was guilty of the Corruption of Churches and Ministry and of the ruine of the true Church Discipline and substituting an heterogeneal thing in its stead And thus the Et caetera Oath which was imposed on us for the unalterable subjecting of us to Diocesans was a chief means to alienate me and many others from it For now our drowsie mindlesness of that subject was shaken off by their violence and we that thought it best to follow our business and live in quietness and let the Bishops alone were rowzed by the terrours of an Oath to look about us and understand what we did § 23. This Oath also stirred up the differing Parties who before were all one Party even quiet Conformists to speak more bitterly against one another than heretofore And the dissenting Party began to think better of the Cause of Nonconformity and to honour the Nonconformists more than they had done And it fell out that at the same time when we were thus rowzed up in England or a little before the Scots were also awakened in Scotland For when all was quiet there under a more moderate Episcopacy than we had then in England though that Nation had been used to Presbytery a new Common-Prayer Book that is the English one with some few Alterations was framed and imposed on the People of Scotland who having not been used to that way of Worship one Woman in Edenburgh cried out in the Church Popery Popery and threw her Stool at the Priest and others imitated her presently and drove him out of the Church and this little Spark set all Scotland quickly in a Flame Insomuch that other Places taking as much distaste at the Common Prayer and at the Bishops also for its sake and for fear of the Silencing of their Ministers and some Ministers increasing their distaste the Lords presently were divided also insomuch that the King was fain to instruct the Earl of Trequaire as his Commissioner to suppress the Maiecontents But in a short time the number of them so encreased that the King's Commissioners could do no good on them but they got the power of all the Land because the far greatest part of the Nobility with the Ministry were conjoyned Hereupon they all entered into a National Covenant to the same purpose as formerly that Nation had done but they did it without the King's Authority The Oath or Covenant was against Popery and Prelacy and Superstition and to uphold the Gospel and Reformation The Aberdeen Doctors dissented from the Covenant and many Writings past on both sides between the Covenanters and them till at last the ensuing Wars did turn the Debates to another strain § 24. It fell out unhappily that at the same time while the Scots were thus discontented the King had imposed a Tax here called Ship-money as for the strengthning of the Navy which being done without Consent of Parliament made a wonderful murmuring all over the Land especially among the Country Nobility and Gentry for they took it as the overthrow of the Fundamental Laws or Constitution of the Kingdom and of Parliaments and of all Propriety They said that the Subjects Propriety in his Estate and the Being of Parliaments and that no Laws be made nor Moneys taken from the Subjects but by the Parliaments Consent are part of the Constitution of the Republick or Government And they said that the King having long disused Parliaments upon Displeasure against them because they curbed Monopolies and corrected Abuses of Officers c. had no way to lay them by for ever but to invade the Subjects Propriety and to assume the power of laying Taxes and raising Moneys without them and that if thus Parliaments and Propriety were destroyed the Government was dissolved or altered and no Man had any Security of Estate or Liberty or Life but the Pleasure of the King whose Will would be the only Law They said also that those that counselled him to this were Enemies to the Commonwealth and unfitter to counsel him than Parliaments who are his highest Court and Council The
Church the bowing to Altars the Book for Sports on Sundays the Casting out of Ministers the troubling of the People by the High-Commission Court the Pilloring and Cutting off Mens Ears Mr. Burtons Mr. Prins and Dr. Bastwicks for speaking against the Bishops the putting down Lectures and Afternoon Sermons and Expositions on the Lord's Days with such other things which they thought of greater weight than Ship-money But because these later agreed with the former in the Vindication of the Peoples Propriety and Liberties the former did the easilier concur with them against the Proceedings of the Bishops and High Commission Court And as soon as their Inclination was known to the People all Countreys sent in their Complaints and Petitions It was presently known how many Ministers Bishop Wren and others of them had suspended and silenced how many thousand Families had been driven to flie into Holland and how many thousand into New-England Scarce a Minister had been Silenced that was alive but it was put into a Petition Mr. Peter Smart of Durham and Dr. Layton a Scotch Physician who wrote a Book called Sion's Plea against the Prelates were released out of their long Imprisonment Mr. Burton Mr. Prin and Dr. Bastwick who as is said had been pillored and their Ears cut off and they sent into a supposed perpetual Imprisonment into the distant Castles of Gernsey Iersey and Carnarvon were all set free and Damages voted them for their wrong And when they came back to London they were met out of the City by abundance of the Citizens with such Acclamations as could not but seem a great Affront to the King and be much displeasing to him The Lord Keeper Finch and Secretary Windebank fled beyond Sea and saved themselves The guilty Judges were deeply accused and some of them imprisoned for the Cause of Ship-money But the great Displeasure was against the Lord Deputy Wentworth and Archbishop Laud Both these were sent to the Tower and a Charge drawn up against them and managed presently against the Lord Deputy by the ablest Lawyers and Gentlemen of the House This held them work a considerable time The King was exceeding unwilling to consent unto his death and therefore used all his skill to have drawn off the Parliament from so hot a Prosecution of him And now began the first Breach among themselves For the Lord Falkland the Lord Digby and divers other able Men were for the sparing of his Life and gratifying the King and not putting him on a thing so much displeasing to him The rest said If after the Attempt of Subverting the Fundamental Laws and Liberties no one Man shall suffer Death it will encourage others hereafter to the like The Londoners petitioned for Iustice And too great numbers of Apprentices and others being imboldened by the Proceedings of the Parliament and not fore-knowing what a Fire the Sparks of their temerity would kindle did too triumphingly and disorderly urge the Parliament crying Iustice Iustice. And it is not unlikely that some of the Parliament-men did encourage them to this as thinking that some backward Members would be quickned by Popular Applause And withal to work on the Members also by disgrace some insolent Painter did seditiously draw the Pictures of the chief of them that were for saving the Lord Deputy and called them the Straffordians he being Earl of Strafford and hang'd them with their Heels upward on the Exchange Though it cannot be expected that in so great a City there should be no Persons so indiscreet as to commit such disorderly Actions as these yet no sober Men should countenance them or take part with them whatever ends might be pretended or intended The King called these Tumults the Parliament called them the Cities Petitioning Those that connived at them were glad to see the People of their mind in the main and thought it would do much to facilitate their Work and hold the looser Members to their Cause For though the House was unanimous enough in condemning Ship-money and the Et caetera Oath and the Bishops Innovations c. yet it was long doubtful which side would have the major Vote in the matter of the Earl of Strafford's Death and such other Acts as were most highly displeasing to the King But disorderly means do generally bring forth more Disorders and seldom attain any good end for which they are used § 28. The Parliament also had procured the King to consent to several Acts which were of great importance and emboldened the People by confirming their Authority As an Act against the High Commission Court and Church-mens Secular or Civil Power and an Act that this Parliament should not be dissolved till its own Consent alledging that the dissolving of Parliaments emboldened Delinquents and that Debts and Disorders were so great that they could not be overcome by them in a little time Also an Act for Triennial Parliaments And the People being confident that all these were signed by the King full sore against his will and that he abhorred what was done did think that the Parliament which had constrained him to this much could carry it still in what they pleased and so grew much more regardful of the Parliament and sided with them not only for their Cause and their own Interest but also as supposing them the stronger side which the Vulgar are still apt to follow § 29. But to return to my own matters This Parliament among other parts of their Reformation resolved to reform the corrupted Clergy and appointed a Committee to receive Petitions and Complaints against them which was no sooner understood but multitudes in all Countreys came up with Petitions against their Ministers The King and Parliament were not yet divided but concurred and so no partaking in their Differences was any part of the Accusation of these Ministers till long after when the Wars had given the occasion and then that also came into their Articles but before it was only matter of Insufficiency false Doctrine illegal Innovations or Scandal that was brought in against them Mr. Iohn White being the Chair-man of the Committee for Scandalous Ministers as it was called published in print one Century first of Scandalous Ministers with their Names Places and the Articles proved against them where so much ignorance insufficiency drunkenness filthiness c. was charged on them that many moderate men could have wished that their Nakedness had been rather hid and not exposed to the Worlds derision and that they had remembred that the Papists did stand by and would make sport of it Another Century also was after published Among all these Complainers the Town of Kederminster in Worcestershire drew up a Petition against their Ministers The Vicar of the place they Articled against as one that was utterly insufficient for the Ministry presented by a Papist unlearned preached but once a quarter which was so weakly as exposed him to laughter and perswaded them that he understood not the very Substantial Articles of
Soldier saith It is my Commission and the High Court of Parliament saith It is the Law declared in a Court of Justice a Parliament seemeth to be the properest Judge As in Controversies of Physick who is to be believed before the Colledge of Physicians Or in Controversies of Religion who before a General Council If the House of York and Lancaster â—ight for the Crown and both Command the Subjects Arms. the poor Peasants are not able to judge of their Titles And if a Parliament shall not judge for them who shall These were the Reasons which caused Men to adhere to the Parliament in this War § 55. For my own part I freely confess that I was not judicious enough in Politicks and Law to decide this Controversie which so many Lawyers and Wise men differed in And I freely confess that being astonished at the Irish Massacre and perswaded fully both of the Parliaments good endeavours for Reformation and of their real danger my Judgment of the main Cause much swayed my Judgment in the Matter of the Wars and the Arguments à fine à natureâ necessitate which common Wits are capable of discerning did too far incline my Judgment in the Cause of the War before I well understood the Arguments from our particular Laws And the Consideration of the Quality of the Parties that sided for each Cause in the Countries did greatly work with me and more than it should have done And I verily thought that if that which a Judge in Court saith sententially is Law must go for Law to the Subject as to the Decision of that Cause though the King send his Broad Seal against it then that which the Parliament saith is Law is Law to the Subjects about the Dangers of the Common-wealth whatever it be in it self and that if the King's Broad-Seal cannot prevail against the Judge much less against their Judgment I make no doubt but both Parties were to blame as it commonly falleth out in most Wars and Contentions and I will not be he that shall Justifie either of them I doubt not but the Headiness and Rashness of the younger unexperienced sort of religious People made many Parliament Men and Ministers overgo themselves to keep pace with those hot Spurs no doubt but much Indiscretion appeared and worse than Indiscretion in the tumultuous Petitioners and much Sin was committed in the dishonouring of the King and provocation of him and in the uncivil Language against the Bishops and Liturgie of the Church But these things came principally from the Sectarian separating Spirit which blew the Coals among foolish Apprentices And as the Sectaries increased so did this Insolence increase I have my self been in London when they have on the Lord's Days stood at the Church Doors while the Common Prayer was reading saying We must stay till he is out of his Pottage And such unchristian Scorns and Jests did please young inconsiderate Wits that knew not what Spirit they were of nor whither such unwarrantate things did tend Learned Mr. Iohn Ball though a Nonconformist discerned the stirrings of this insolent Sectarian Spirit betimes and fell a writing against it even then when some were crying out of Persecution and others were tender of such little Differences One or two in the House and five or six Ministers that came from Holland and a few that were scattered in the City which were the Brownists Relicts did drive on others according to their own dividing Principles and sowed the Seeds which afterward spread over all the Land though then there were very few of them in the Countreys even next to none As Bishop Hall speaks against the justifying of the Bishops so do I against justifying the Parliament Ministers or City I believe many unjustifiable things were done but I think that few Men among them all were the Doers or Instigaters of it But I then thought that whosoever was faulty the Peoples Liberties and Safety could not be forfeited And I thought that all the Subjects were not guilty of all the Faults of King or Parliament when they defended them Yea that if both their Causes had been bad as against each other yet that the Subjects should adhere to that Party which most secured the welfare of the Nation and might defend the Land under their Conduct without owning all their Cause And herein I confess I was then so zealous that I thought it a great Sin for Men that were able to defend their Country to be Neuters And I have been tempted since to think that I was a more competent Judge upon the Place when all things were before our eyes than I am in the review of those Days and Actions so many Years after when Distance disadvantageth the Apprehension A Writer against Cromwel's Decimation recanting his great Adherence to the Parliament in that War yet so abhorreth Neutrality that he likeneth him rather to a Dog than a Man that could stand by when his Country was in such a case But I confess for my part I have not such censorious Thoughts of those that then were Neuters as formerly I have had For he that either thinketh both sides raised an unlawful War or that could not tell which if either was in the right might well be excused if he defended neither I was always satisfied 1. That the Dividers of the King and Parliament were the Traitors whoever they were and that the Division tended to the Dissolution of the Government 2. And that the Authority and Person of the King were inviolable out of the reach of just Accusation Judgment or Execution by Law as having no Superiour and so no Judge 3. I favoured the Parliaments Cause as they professed 1. To bring Delinquents to a Legal Trial 2. And to preserve the Person and Government of the King by a Conjunction with his Parliament But Matters that Warrs and Blood are any way concerned in are so great and tenderly to be handled that I profess to the World that I dare not I will not justifie any thing that others or I my self have done of any such consequence But though I never hurt the Person of any Man yet I resolve to pray daily and earnestly to God that he will reveal to me whatever I have done amiss and not suffer me through Ignorance to be impenitent and would forgive me both my known and unknown Sins and cleanse this Land from the Guilt of Blood § 56. Having inserted this much of the Case of History of those Times I now proceed to the Relation of the Passages of my own Life beginning where I left When I was at Kidderminster the Parliament made an Order for all the People to take a Protestation to defend the King's Person Honour and Authority the Power and Priviledges of Parliaments the Liberties of the Subject and the Protestant Religion against the common Enemy meaning the Papists the Irish Massacre and Threatnings occasioning this Protestation I obeyed them in joyning with the Magistrate in offering
from their Houses and more such Penalties which I remember not so short Lived a Commonwealth deserved no long Remembrance Mr. Vines and Dr. Rainbow and many more were hereupon put out of their Headships in the Universities and Mr. Sidrach Sympson and Mr. Io. Sadler and such others put in yea such a Man as Mr. Dell the Chaplain of the Army who I think neither understood himself nor was understood by others any farther than to be one who took Reason Sound Doctrine Order and Concord to be the intollerable Maladies of Church and State because they were the greatest Strangers to his Mind But poor Dr. Edward Reignolds had the hardest Measure for when he refused to take the Engagement his Place was forfeited and afterwards they drew him to take it in hopes to keep his Place which was no less than the Deanarie of Christ's-Church and then turned him out of all and offered his Place to Mr. Ios. Caryll but he refusing it it was conferred on Dr. Owen to whom it was continued from year to year And because the Presbyterians still urged the Covenant against killing the King and pulling down the Parliament and setting up a Commonwealth and taking the Engagement some of the Independent Brethren maintained that its Obligation ceased because it was a League and the Occasion of it ceased And some of the Rump said it was like an Almanack out of date and some of the Souldiers said they never took it and others of them railed at it as a Scottish Snare So that when their Interest would not suffer them to keep so solemn a Vow their Wills would not suffer their Judgments to confess it to be Obligatory at least as to the part which they must violate § 100. For my own part though I kept the Town and Parish of Kiderminster from taking the Covenant and seeing how it might become a Snare to their Consciences yea and most of Worcestershire besides by keeping the Ministers from offering it in any of the Congregations to the People except in Worcester City where I had no great Interest and know not what they did yet I could not judge it seemly for him that believed there is a God to play fast and loose with a dreadful Oath as if the Bonds of National and Personal Vows were as easily shak'd off as Sampson's Cords Therefore I spake and preach'd against the Engagement and dissuaded Men from taking it The first hour that I heard of it being in Company with some Gentlemen of Worcestershire I presently wrote down above twenty Queries against it intending as many more almost against the Obligation as those were about the Sense and Circumstances And one that was present got the Copy of them and shortly after I met with them verbatim in a Book of Mr. Henry Hall's as his own one that was long imprisoned for writing against Cromwell Some Episcopal Divines that were not so scrupulous it seems as we did write for it private Manuscripts which I have seen and plead the irresistability of the Imposers and they found starting holes in the Terms viz. That by the Common-wealth they will mean the present Commonwealth in genere and by Established they will mean only de facto and not de jure and by without a King c. they mean not quatenus but Etsi and that only de facto pro tempore q. d. I will be true to the Government of England though at the present the King and House of Lords are put out of the Exercise of their power These were the Expositions of many Episcopal Men and others that took it But I endeavoured to evince that this is meer jugling and jesting with Matters too great to be jested with And that as they might easily know that the Imposers had another sense so as easily might they know that the words in their own obvious usual sense among men must be taken as the Promise or Engagement of a Subject as such to a Form of Government now pretended to be established And that the Subjects Allegiance or Fidelity to his Rulers can be acknowledged and given in no plainer words And that by such Interpretations and Stretchings of Conscience any Treasonable Oath or Promise may be taken and no Bonds of Society can signifie much with such Interpreters § 101. England and Ireland being thus Conquered by Cromwell by deluding well-meaning Men into his Service and covering his Ambition with the Lord Fairfax's Generalship the Parliament being imprisoned and cast out the King cut off and the Rump established as a new Commonwealth those great and solid Men Pim Hampden c. being long before dead and rid out of his way who else had been like to have prevailed against the Plots of Vane in the Parliament you would think there were nothing now standing in his way to hinder him from laying hands upon the Crown But four Impediments yet stood before him 1. The numerous Cavaliers or Royalists ready for new Enterprizes against him 2. The Scots who resolved to stick to the Covenant and the King 3. The Army which must be untaught all the Principles which he is now permitting them to learn For those Principles which must bring him to the Crown are the worst in the World for him when once he is there 4. The Ministers of England and Scotland and all the sober People who regarded them The first of these he most easily though not without strugling overcame making his advantage by all their Enterprizes The second put him harder to it but he overcame them at last The third proved yet a greater difficulty but he seemed absolutely to overcome it yet leaving still some Life in the root The fourth strove against him more calmly and prudently with invincible Weapons and though they were quiet were never overcome but at last revived the spark of Life which was left in the third and thereby gave a Resurrection to the first and second and so recovered all at last not to the state of their own Interest or to that Condition of Church Affairs which they desired but to that Civil State of Royal Government to which they were engaged and from which the Nation seemed to have fallen These are the true Contents of the following parts that were acted in these Lands The Rump I might mention as another of his Impediments but as they now were doing his work so I conjoyn the Relicts of them which then disturbed him with the Army who were the strength by which they did it § 102. The King being dead his Son was by right immediately King and from that time he dateth his Reign The Scots send Messengers to him to come over to them and take the Crown But they treat with him first for his taking of the Covenant and renouncing the Wars and the Blood that was shed in them by his Fathers Party By which I perceive that the Scots understood the Clause in the Covenant of Defending the King's Person and Authority in the Defence
suggest nor did we ever hear any just Reasons given for their diâ—ient from the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy or Prelacy as it was stated and established in this Kingdom Which we believe to be for the main the true ancient primitive Episcopacy and that to be more than a meer presidency of Order Neither do we find that the same was in any Time ballanced or managed by any Authoritative Commixtion of Presbyters therewith Though it hath been then and in all Times since usually exercised with the Assistance and Counsel of Presbyters in subordination to the Bishops § 8. And we cannot but wonder that the Administration of Government by one single Person should by them be affirmed to be so liable to Corruptions Partialities Tyrannies and other Evils that for the avoiding thereof it should be needful to have others joyned with him in the power of Government Which if applyed to the Civil State is a most dangerous Insinuation And we verily believe what Experience and the Constitutions of Kingdoms Armies and even private Families sufficiently confirmeth in all which the Government is administred by the Authority of one single Person although the Advice of others may be requisite also but without any share in the Government that the Government of many is not only most subject to all the aforesaid Evils and Inconveniencies but more likely also to breed and soment perpetual Factions both in Church and State than the Government by one is or can be And since no Government can certainly prevent all Evils that which is liable to the least and sewest is certainly to be preferred As to the four particular Instances of things amiss c. § 9. 1. We cannot grant that the Extent of any Diocess is so great but that the Bishop may well perform that wherein the proper Office and Duty of a Bishop doth consist which is not the personal Inspection of every Man's Soul under his Government which is the Work of every Parochial Minister in his Cure but the Pastoral Charge of overseeing directing and taking care that the Ministers and other Ecclesiastical Officers within his Diocess do their several respective Duties in their several Stations as they ought to do And if some Diocesses shall be thought of too large Extent the Bishops may have Suffragan Bishops to assist them as the Laws allow It being a great mistake that the Personal Inspection of the Bishop is in all places of his Diocess at all times necessary For by the same reason neither Princes nor Governours of Provinces nor Generals of Armies nor Mayors of great Cities nor Ministers of great Parishes could ever be able to discharge their Duties in their several Places and Charges § 10. 2. We confess the Bishops did as by the Law they were enabled depute part of the Administration of their Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions to Chancellors Commissaries and Officials as Men better skill'd in the Civil and Canon Laws But as for Matters of more Spiritual Concernment viz. the Sentences of Excommunication and Absolution with other Censures of the Church we conceive they belong properly to the Bishop to decree and pronounce either by himself where for the present he resideth or by some grave Ecclesiastical Person by him Surrogated for that purpose in such Places where he cannot be Personally present Wherein if many things have been done amiss for the time past or shall be seasonably conceived inconvenient for the future we shall be as willing to have the same Reformed and Remedied as any other Persons whatsoever § 11. 3. Whether a Bishop be a distinct Order from Presbyter or not or whether they have power of sole Ordination or no is not now the Question But we affirm that the Bishops of this Realm have constantly for ought we know or have heard to the contrary Ordained with the Assistance of Presbyters and the Imposition of their Hands together with the Bishops And we conceive it very fit that in the exercise of that part of their Jurisdiction which appertaineth to the Censures of the Church they should likewise have the Advice and Assistance of some Presbyters And for this purpose the Colledges of Deans and Chapters are thought to have been instituted that the Bishops in their several Diocess might have their Advice and Assistance in the Administration of their weighty Pastoral Charge § 12. 4. This last dependeth upon Matter of Fact Wherein if any Bishops have or shall do otherwise than according to Law they were and are to be answerable for the same And it is our desire as well as theirs that nothing may be done or imposed by the Bishop but according to the known Laws For Reforming of which Evils c. § 13. 1. The Primates Reduction though not published in his Life time was formed many years before his Death and shewed to some Persons ready to attest the same in the Year 1640. but it is not consistent with two other Discourses of the same Learned Primate viz. the one of the Original of Episcopacy and the other of the Original of Metropolitans both printed in the Year 1641. and written with great diligence and much variety of ancient Learning In neither of which is to be found any mention of the Reduction aforesaid Neither is there in either of them propounded any such Model of Church Government as in the said Reduction is contained Which doubtless would have been done had that Platform been according to his setled Judgment in those Matters In which Reduction there are sundry things as namely the Conforming of Suffragans to the number of Rural Deaneries which are apparently private Conceptions of his own accommodated at that time for the taking off some present from Animosities but wholly destitute of any Colour of Testimony or President from Antiquity nor is any such by him offered towards the proof thereof And it would be considered whether the Final Resolution of all Ecclesiastical Power and Jurisdiction into a National Synod where it seemeth to be placed in that Reduction without naming the King or without any dependance upon him or relation to him be not destructive of the King's Supremacy in causes Ecclesiastical It is observable nevertheless that even in the Reduction Archi-Episcopacy is acknowledged As for the super-added Particulars § 14. 1. The Appointment and Election of Suffragans is by the Law already vested in the King whose Power therein is by the Course here proposed taken away § 15. 2. What they mean by Associations in this place they explain not but we conceive it dangerous that any Association whatsoever is understood thereby should be made or entered into without the King's Authority § 16. 3. We do not take the Oaths Promises and Subscriptions by Law required of Ministers at their Ordination Institution c. to be unnecessary although they be responsible to the Laws if they do amiss it being thought requisite as well by such Cautions to prevent Offences as to punish Offenders afterwards Upon all which Consideration it is that
whereas you tell us that the conforming of Suffraganes to Rural Deaneries and other such are his private Conceptions destitute of any Testimoney of Antiquity We answer No marvel when Rural Deaneries were unknown to true Antiquity And when in the Ancientest Church every Church had its proper Bishop and every Bishop but one Church that had also but one Altar But surely the Corepiscopi were no Strangers to Antiquity as may appear before the Council at Nice in Concil Ancyran Can. 12. and in Concil Antiochin Can. 10. c. It was unknown in the days of Ignatius and Iustin Martyr that a Church should be as large as a Rural Deanry containing a dozen Churches with Altars that had none of them peculiar Bishops But it was not strange then that every Church had a Bishop and if it were Rural a Chorepiscopus As also you may gather even from Clemens Romanus The Quarrel which you pick with the Archbishops Reduction for not Naming the King as if he destroyed his Supremacy is such as a low degree of Charity with a little Understanding might easily have prevented Either you know that it is the Power of the Keys called Spiritual and proper-Ecclesiastical and not the Coercive Power circa Ecclesiastica which the Archbishop speaketh of and all our Controversie is about or you do not know it If you do know it either you think this Power of the Keys is resolved into the King or not If you do think so you differ from the King and from all of your selves that ever we talked with and you contradict all Protestant Princes that have openly disclaimed any such Power and published this to the World to stop the Mouths of Calumniating Papists And we have heard the King and some of you disclaim it And how can you then fitly debate these Controversies that differ from all Protestant Kings and from the Church But if you your selves do not so think had you a Pen that would charge the Archbishop for destroying the King's Supremacy for asserting nothing but what the King and you maintain And if you knew not that this Spiritual Power of the Keys as distinct from Magistratical Coercive Power is the Subject of our Controversie we dispute to good purpose indeed with Men that know not what Subject it is that we are to dispute about so that which way soever it go you see how it is like to fall and how Men that are out of the dust and noise will judge of our Debates And here we leave it to the Notice and Observation of Posterity upon the perusal of all your Exceptions How little the English Bishops had to say against the Form of Primitive Episcopacy contained in Archbishop Usher's Reduction in the day when they rather chose the increase of our Divisions the Silencing of many Hundred faithful Ministers the scattering of the Flocks the afflicting of so many thousand godly Christians than the accepting of this Primitive Episcopacy which was the Expedient which those called Presbyterians offered never once speaking for the Cause of Presbytery And what kind of Peace-makers and Conciliators we met with when both Parties were to meet at one time and place with their several Concessions for Peace and Concord ready drawn up and the Presbyterians in their Concessions laid by all their Cause and proposed an Archbishops frame of Episcopacy and the other side brought not in any of their Concessions at all but only unpeaceably rejected all the Moderation that was desired Lastly They hear desire it may be observed that in this Reduction Archiepiscopacy is acknowledged And we shall also desire that it may be observed that we never put in a word to them against Archbishops Metropolitans or Primates and yet we are very far from attaining any Peace with them And we desire that it may be observed also that understanding with whom we had to do we offered them not that which we approved our selves as the best but that which we would submit to as having some Consistency with the Discipline and Order of the Church which was our End Of the Superadded Particulars § 14. 1. This is scarce Serious The Primate's Suffragans or Chorepiscopi are Rural Deans or as many for number The Suffragans you talk of by Law are other things about Sixteen in all the Land The King's Power is about the Choice of them as Humane Officers but as Pastors of the Church or Bishops the Churches had the Choice for a Thousand years after Christ through most of the Christian World And what if it be in the King's power Is it not the more reasonable that the King be petitioned to in the Business The King doth not choose every Rural Dean himself And is it any more destructive of his Power to do it by the Synods than by the Diocesan This use the Name and Power of Kings is made of by some kind of Men to make a noise against all that cross their Domination but all that is exercised by themselves is no whit derogatory to Royalty And yet how many Men have been Excommunicated for refusing to Answer in the Chancellor's Courts till they profess to sit there by the King's Authority § 15. We much doubt whether you designed to read the Archbishop's Reduction when you answered our Papers If you did not why would you choose to be ignorant of what you answered when so light a Labour might have informed you If you did how could you be ignorant of what we meant by Associations when you saw that such as our Rural Deaneries was the thing spoken of and proposed by the Reduction And 1. Are the Rural Deaneries think you without the King's Authority If not what mean you by such Intimations unless you would make Men believe that we breathe Treason as oft as we breathe as the Soldier charged the Country-man for whistling Treason when he meant to plunder him 2. And what though Associations may not be entered into without the King's Authority Do you mean that therefore we may not thus desire his Authority for them If you do not to what sence or purpose is this Answer Sure we are that for Three hundred years when Magistrates were not Christian there was Preaching Praying and Associating in particular Churches hereunto without the Kings Authority and also Associating in Synods And after that for many a Hundred year the Christian Magistrates confirmed and over-ruled such Associations but never overthrew them or forbad them § 16. But the Apostles of Christ and all his Churches for many hundred years thought all these Subscriptions and Oaths unnecessary and never prescribed nor required either them or any such So unhappy is the present Church in the happy Understandings of these Men of Yesterday that are wiser than Christ his Apostles and Universal Church and have at last found out these necessary Oaths and Subscriptions And you are not quite mistaken Necessary they are to set up those that shall rule by Constraint as Lords over God's Heritage and
you know that there are many Dissenters as Papists Quakers c. for whom we never medled And we think this an unjust Answer to be given to them who craved of his Majesty that they might send to their Brethren through the Land to have the Testimony of their common Consent and were denied it and told that it should be our work alone and imputed to no others In Conclusion we perceive your Counsels against Peace are not likely to be frustrated Your Desires concerning us are like to be accomplished You are like to be gratified with our Silence and Ejection and the Excommunication and Consequent sufferings of Dissenters And yet we will believe that blessed are the Peace-makers and though Deceit be in the Heart of them that imagin Evil yet there is Ioy to the Counsellors of Peace Prov. 12. 20. And though we are slopt by you in our following of Peace and are never like thus publickly to seek it more because you think that we must hold our Tongues that you may hold your Peace yet are we resolved by the help of God if it be possible and as much as in us lieth to live peaceably with all Men Rom. 12. 18. § 102. Hereupon some very very learned godly Men renewed their former Speeches That it was a vain Attempt to Endeavour a Reconciliation with such Men that their Minds were exasperated and they were resolved to monopolize the Favour of our Prince and all Honours and Preferments to themselves That there was no hope they would do any thing for the promoting of strict serious Godliness or any thing that deserved the Name of Ecclesiastical Discipline That undoubtedly they do but draw us on partly to spin out the time till they are ready to persecute us without any danger to themselves and partly to set us together by the Ears and otherwise abuse us by drawing us to grant them that which they know our Brethren cannot grant § 103. To all this I answered for my own part That though Charity commanded me to hope that there were some Men among them better than this Description doth import yet my Reason forced me all things considered to have as low Expectations of this Conference as they had and that I made no doubt but that the End would verefie much that was said that for my own part I looked e're long to be silenced by them with many hundred more and that all this was but to quiet Men till the time But yet for all that I was fully convinced that it was our Duty not only to yield to an offered Treaty but to be the Seekers of it and follow it on till we see the Issue 1. Because we are commanded if possible as much as in us lieth to live peaceably with all Men. 2. Because though we have too great a probability of such an issue as they describe yet we are not certain of it and the least possibility of a better Issue may shew us that we should wait on God in the use of the Means till we are disappointed 3. Because we have no other means at all to use To keep our Flocks and publick Work we cannot For the old Laws will be in force again if we say nothing and new ones will further enforce them if there be need And for our parts we are not formidable to the Bishops at all were our Number five times as great as theirs For we abhor all Thoughts of Sedition and Rebellion and they know that this is our Judgment and therefore how should they be afraid of Men whose Consciences bind them to make no resistance to the legal Exercise of a lawful Authority If it were the Anabaptists Millinaries or Levellers they would fear them But for my part I thought it very unmeet that such a Word as intimated any formidableness in us should ever come out of our Mouths either to them or to our People or among our selves for it seemeth to intimate either that we would resist or would have them think so 4. And I looked to the end of all these Actions and the chief things that moved me next the pleasing of God and Conscience is that when we are all silenced and persecuted and the History of these things shall be delivered to posterity it will be a just Blot upon us if we suffer as refusing to sue for Peace and it will be our just Vindication when it shall appear that we humbly petitioned for and earnestly pursued after Peace and came as near them for the obtaining it as Scripture and Reason will allow us to do and were ready to do anything for Peace except to sin and damn our Souls And for my own part I could suffer much more comfortably when I had used these means and been repulsed than if I had used none 5. And Lastly I gave them all notice that I hoped if we got no more to have an opportunity by this Treaty to state our Difference right to the understanding of Foreigners and Posterity and to bear my Testimony to the Cause of Truth and Peace and Godliness openly under the Protection of the King's Authority both by Word and Writing which they that sat still would never do but look on with secret silent Grief till all is gone and then have their Consciences and others tell them that they never made any just attempt or spake a Word to prevent the Ruine § 104. But as to the point of yielding too far to them I told them first that moderate Episcopacy was agreeable to my Judgment and that they knew that I medled not as a Presbyterian but as a Christian that is obliged to seek the Churches Peace And also that others may accept of those Terms as better than worse which yet they cannot take to be the best And if we mist it as to the way or terms our Brethren that thought so had the Liberty to acquaint us with our Error and to set us right § 105. Shortly after this instead of the Diocesans Concessions it was told us that the King would put all that he thought meet to grant us into the Form of a Declaration and we should see it first and have Liberty to give notice of what we liked not as not consistent with the desired Concord◠and so the Diocesans cannot be charged with any mutability as having ever granted us such Abatements which after they receded from We thankfully accepted of this Offer and received from the Lord Chancellor the following Copy of the Declaration This Copy of a Declaration the Lord Chancellor next sent us to peruse and alter before it were published that it might satisfie our Desires Received on Sept. 4. His Majesty's Declaration to all his loving Subjects of his Kingdom of England and Dominion of Wales concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs HOW much the Peace of the State is concerned in the Peace of the Church and how difficult a thing it is to preserve Order and Government in Civil whilst there is no Order
Milkstreet for which they allowed me 40 l. per Annum which I continued near a year till we were all Silenced And at the same time I preached once every Lord's Day at Blackfryars where Mr. Gibbons a judicious Man was Minister In Milkstreet I took Money because it came not from the Parishioners but Strangers and so was no wrong to the Minister Mr. Vincent a very holy blameless Man But at Blackfryars I never took a Penny because it was the Parishioners who called me who would else be less able and ready to help their worthy Pastor who went to God by a Consumption a little after he was silenced and put out At these two Churches I ended the Course of my Publick Ministry unless God cause an undeserved Resurrection § 165. Here also my Accusations followed me as maliciously and falsly as before and I was fain to clear my self by printing some of my Sermons in a little Book called Now or Never and in part of another called a Saint or a Bruit § 166. Before this I resolved to go to the Archbishop of Canterbury then Bishop of London to ask him for his License to preach in his Diocess Some Brethren blamed me for it as being an owning of Prelatical Usurpation I told them that the King had given him a power to suffer or hinder me and if he had no power at all I might lawfully desire any Man not to hinder me in my Duty much more having power as the Church-Magistrate or Officer of the King And though I was under no necessity I would not refuse a lawful thing when Authority required it The Archibishop received me with very great expression of Respects and offered me his License and would let his Secretary take no Money of me But he offered me the Book to Subscribe in I told him that he knew that the King's Declaration exempted us from Subscription He bid me write what I would I told him that what I resolved to do and I thought meet for him to expect I would do of choice though I might forbear And so in Latin I subscribed my promise not to preach against the Doctrine of the Church or the Ceremonies established by Law in his Diocess while I used his License And I told him how grievous it was to me to be daily haunted with such general Accusations behind my back and asked him why I was never accused of any Particulars And he confessed to me That if they had got any Particulars that would have deserved it I should have heard particularly from him I scarce think that I ever preached a Sermon without a Spy to give them his report of it § 167. But my last Sermon that ever I preached in Publick being at Blackfryars was defamed with this particular Accusation That I told them that the Gospel was now departing from them Insomuch as the Lady Balcarres told me That even the old Queen of Bobemia told her she wondered that I was so impudent as to say the Gospel was going away because that I and such as I were silenced while others were put into our places But all this was the breath of Mis-reporters without any colour of ground from any thing that I had said as may be seen in the printed Sermons § 168. For when the Ministers were all silenced some covetous Booksellers got Copies of the last Sermons of many of them from the Scribes that took them from their Mouths Some of them were taken word by word which I heard my self but some of us were much abused by it and especially my self for they stiled it A Farewel Sermon and mangled so both Matter and Style that I could not own it besides the printing it to the offense of Governours So that afterwards I writ out the Sermon more at large my self on Col. 2. 6 7. with another Discourse and offered them to the Press but could not get them Licensed for Reasons afterwards to me mentioned § 169. On April 23. was his Majesty's Coronation Day the Day being very serene and fair till suddenly in the Afternoon as they were returning from Westminster-hall there was very terrible Thunders when none expected it Which made me remember his Father's Coronation on which being a Boy at School and having leave to play for the Solemnity an Earthquake about two a Clock in the Afternoon did affright the Boys and all the Neighbourhood I intend no Commentary on these but only to relate the Matter of Fact § 170. To return at last to our Treaty with the Bishops If you observe the King's Declaration you will find that though Matters of Government seemed to be determined yet the Liturgy was to be reviewed and reformed and new Forms drawn up in Scripture phrase suiâ—ed to the several parts of Worship that Men might use which of them they pleased as already there were some such variety of Forms in some Offices of that Book This was yet to be done and till this were done we were uncertain of the Issue of all our Treaty but if that were done and all setled by Law our Divisions were at an end Therefore being often with the Lord Chancellour on the forementioned occasions I humbly intreated him to hasten the finishing of that Work that we might rejoyce in our desired Concord At last Dr. Reignolds and Mr. Calamy were authorized to name the Persons on that side to manage the Treaty and a Commission was granted under the Broad Seal to the Persons nominated on both sides I intreated Mr. Calamy and Dr. Reignolds to leave me out for though I much desired the Expedition of the Work I found that the last Debates had made me unacceptable with my Superiours and this would much more increase it and other Men might be fitter who were less distasted But I could not prevail with them unless I would have peremptorily refused it to Excuse me So they named as Commissioners Dr. Tuckney Dr. Conant Dr. Spurstow Dr. Manton Dr. Wallis Mr. Calamy and my self Mr. Iackson Mr. Case Mr. Clark and Mr. Newcomen besides Dr. Reignolds then Bishop of Norwich And for Assistants being the other Party had Assistants Dr. Horton Dr. Iacomb Dr. Bates Mr. Rawlinson Mr. Cooper Dr. Lightfoot Dr. Collins Mr. Woodbridge and Dr. Drake According to the King's Commission we were to meet and manage our Conference in order to the Ends therein expressed The Commission is as followeth CHARLES the Second by the Grace of God King of England Scotland France and Ireland Defender of the Faith c. To our trusty and well-beloved the most Reverend Father in God accepted Archbishop of York the Right Reverend Father in God Gilbert Bishop of London Iohn Bishop of Durham Iohn Bishop of Rochester Henry Bishop of Chichester Humphrey Bishop of Sarum George Bishop of Worcester Robert Bishop of Lincoln Benjamin Bishop of Peterburgh Bryan Bishop of Chester Richard Bishop of Carlisle Iohn Bishop of Exeter Edward Bishop of Norwich and to our trusty and well-beloved the Reverend
that Christ should have no one Witness that would ever scruple or contradict them either among the Orthodox or the Hereticks as far as any Records of Antiquity do make known § 300. 7. The seventh Controversie is about their own practice in Administrations and Church Discipline And 1. that they must Ministerially deny the Sacrament of Baptism to all Children whose Parents will not have them use the Cross they say that it is the Church that refuseth them by Law and not they who are by the Law disabled from receiving them 2. The same they say of their refusing to give the Lord's Supper to any that will not kneel in the Reception of it They say that it is better to Administer the Sacraments to some than to none at all which they must do if they refuse not them that kneel not 3. And for the giving of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper to the unworthy for all are forced to use them they say that the Infants of all in the Church have right to Baptism at least for their Ancestor's sake and for the Godfathers and Godmothers or the Churches sake And for the Lord's Supper they have power to put away all that are proved impenitent in notorious Scandal § 301. Having told you what the Conformists say for themselves as faithfully as will stand with brevity before I proceed I think it best to set down here the words 1. Of the Covenant 2. Of the Subscription and Declaration 3. Of the Oath of Canonical Obedience before your Eyes that while the Subject of the Controversie is before you the Controversie it self may be the better understood And I suppose the Reader to have all the Books before him to which we are required to Assen◠〈…〉 The Solemn League and Covenant WE Noblemen Barons Knights Gentlemen Citizens â—â—â—gesses Ministers of the Gospel and Commous of all 〈◊〉 in the Kingdoms of Scotland â—England and Ireland by the Pâ—â—vidence of God living under one King and being of one Reformed Religion having before our Eyes the Glory of God and the Advancement of the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ the Honour and Happiness of the King's Majesty and his Posterity and the true Publick Liberty Safety and Peace of the Kingdoms wherein every ones private Condition is included And calling to mind the trâ—atherous and bloody Piots Conspiracies Attempts and Practises of the Enemies of God against the true Religion and Professors thereof in places especially in these three Kingdoms ever since the Reformation of Religion and how much their Rage Power and Presumption are of late and at this time increased and exercised whereof the deplorable Estate of the Church and Kingdom of Ireland the distressed Estate of the Church and Kingdom of England and the dangerous Estate of the Church and Kingdom of Scotland are present and publick Cestimonies We have now at last after other means of Supplication Remonstrance Protestations and Sufferings for the preservation of our selves and our Religion from utter Ruine and Destruction according to the Commendable Practice of these kingdoms in former times and the Example of God's People in other Nations after mature Deliberation resolved and determined to enter into a Mutual and Solemn League and Covenant Wherein we all Subscribe and each one of us for himself with our Hands lifted up to the most high God â—o swear 1. THat we shall sincerely really and constantly through the Grace of God endeavour in our several Places and Callings the Preservation of the Reformed Religion in the Church of Scotland in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government against our Common Enemies The Reformation of Religion in the Kingdoms of England and Ireland in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government according to the Word of God and the Example of the best Reformed Churches And shall endeavour to bring the Churches of God in the three Kingdoms to the nearest Conjunction and Uniformity in Religion Confession of Faith Form of Church Government Directory for Worship and Catechizing That we and our Posterity after us may as Brethren live in Faith and Love the Lord may delight to dwell in the midst of us 2. That we shall in like manner without respect of Persons endeavour the Extirpation of Popery Prelacy that is Church-Government by Archbishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commistaties Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-deacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on that Hierachy Superstition Heresie Schism Prophaneness 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 And that the Lord may be one and his Name one in the three Kingdoms 3. We shall with the same sincerity reality and constancy in our several Uocations endeavour with our Estates and Lives mutually to preserve the Rights and Priviledges of the Parliaments and the Liberties of the Kingdoms and to preserve and defend the King's Majesties Person and Authority in the preservation and defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the Kingdoms That the world may bear witness with our Consciences of our Loyalty and that we have no thoughts or intentions to diminish his Majesties just Power and Greatness 4. We shall also with all faithfulness endeavour the discovery of all such as have been or shall be Incendiaries Malignants or evil Instruments by hindring the Reformation of Religion dividing the King from his People or one of the Kingdoms from another or making any faction or Parties amongst the People contrary to this League and Covenant That they may be brought to publick Trial and receive Condign Punishment as the degree of their Offences shall require or deserve or the Supream Iudicatories of both Kingdoms respectively or others having power from them for that effect shall â—udge convenient 5. And whereas the happiness of a blessed Peace between these Kingdoms denied in former times to our Progenitors is by the good Providence of God granted unto us and hath been latlely concluded and setled by both Parliaments We shall each one of us according to our place and interest endeavour that they may remain conjoyned in a firm Peace and Union to all Posterity and that Iustice may be done upon the wilful Opposers thereof in manner expressed in the precedent Article 6. We shall also according to our Places and Callings in this common Cause of Religion Liberty and Peace of the Kingdoms assist and defend all those that enter into this League and Covenant in the maintaining and pursuing thereof And shall not suffer our selves directly or indirectly by whatsoever Combination Perswasion or Terrour to be divided and withdrawn from this blessed Union and Conjunction whether to make defection to the contrary part or to give our selves to a detestable indifferency or neutrality in this Cause which so much concerneth the Glory of God the Good of the Kingdoms and Honour of the King But shall all the days of our
is dangerous for Men to go against the concurrent Judgments of Casuists yea of their own Casuists in the Case of Vows And they know not how to save Subscription from the enmity of the determinations of Dr. Sanderson and all other ordinary Casuists And these are the general Reasons of their fear § 361. But I shall hear tell you what they grant about the obligation of the Covenant 1. They assert that it can bind no Man to any thing that is sinful 2. No nor to any thing that may hereafter be sinful nor from any thing that may be a Duty when it cometh to be such though it were neither Sin nor Duty at the making of the Vow 3. That it bindeth no Man therefore against Obedience to the King though the thing be in it self indifferent and was not commanded by the King when they vowed For if a Man might prevent the Commands of Prince or Parents by his own Vows he might free himself from his Obedience The Command of God to obey Kings and Rulers is antecedent to our Vows and above our Vows and cannot be evacuated or avoided by them Therefore if there be any indifferent thing in the Covenant I will obey the King if he command or forbid it contrary to the Covenant 4. That we take our selves bound by the Covenant to nothing but what is our Duty if there were not such Covenant Not that a Vow doth not bind a Man to things before indifferent We confess it doth But because this Vow included and intended nothing meerly indifferent For it is the Judgment of Protestants and so both of the Framers and the Takers of it that the use of a Vow is not to make new Dutus to our selves which God never made but to bind us to that which God had made our Duty before Else it is a taking of the Name of God in vain All the doubt therefore is but whether it be a secondary Obligation to that which God had before obliged us to So that there is no one Action materially whose doing or not doing we take to depend upon the Covenant's obligation primarily or alone nor do we imagine any thing to be our Duty which would not be so if the Covenant had never had a being 5. That if the Covenanters did then suppose that they were bound to defend and obey the Parliament in that War and to bring a contrary Party to punishment yet now there can be no place for any such Imagination because the Parliament is not in being the War and Difference of Parties is ended Cessante materia câ—ssat obligatio cessantibus personis rerum statu It is now past doubt that we are bound to obey the King and that there is none to stand in competition for our Obedience so that as a League with those persons it ceaseth with the persons 6. That if we had been allowed but to Subscribe That there is no Obligation to endeavour unlawfully or by any unlawful means We had not scrupled so disclaiming any Obligation as on our selves or any other Subjects Thus far there is no Controversie among us about the Covenant § 362. I come now to the Non-Subscribers particular Scruples which are such as these 1. They say That all Men confessing that an Oath or Vow is obligatory they must see good proof that this particular Vow is not so before they can exempt it from the common force of Vows But such proof they have never seen from Mr. Fullwood Mr. Sâ—â—â—man Dr. Gauden or any that hath attempted it and on whom it is incumbent but rather admire that Men of so great Judgment and Tenderness of Conscience should ever be satisfied with such halting Arguments which they had long ago more fully confuted if the Law had not forbidden them They herein argue as the Bishops in another Case Uncertainties must give place to Certainties caeteris paribus But they are certain in general that Vows are obligatory if materially lawful and they are uncertain that this Vow it materially unlawful and so not obligatory Ergo they dare not say that no Man is obliged by it § 363. 2. They say That all the World confesseth that a Vow obligeth 〈◊〉 necessariâ to that which is antecedently a Duty but they propound it to consideration whether all these things following which are in the Covenant are certainly no Duties antecedently 1. To endeavour in our several Places and Callings the preservation of the Reformed Religion 2. The Reformation of Worship Discipline and Church-Government according to the Word of God in England 3. To bring the Churches of God in the three Kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in Religion 4. To endeavour the extirpation of not Episcopacy but Prelacy that is Church-Government by Archbishops Bishops their Chancellours Commissaries c. that is the fore described Frame Whether that Frame be so blameless as to be allowable I leave to their Judgments who have weighed what is before said 5. The Extirpation of Popery 6. To endeavour the Extirpation of Superstition 7. And of Heresie 8. And of Prophaneness 9. And of whatsoever shall be found contrary to sound Doctrine and the Power of Godliness 10. To endeavour with our Estates and Lives to defend the King's Majesty's Person and Authority in the preservation and defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the Kingdoms and not to diminish his Majesty's just Power and Greatness 11. To be humbled for our own sins and the sins of the Kingdoms 12. To amend our Lives and each one to go before another in the Example of a real Reformation If all these be not Duties let the question be Whether any one of them be a Duty And then Whether that which is antecedently a Duty by Divine Obligation be not further so by Self-obligation when it is vowed with an Oath Or whether a Vow bind not to a Duty But this is but by the by about the sence of the Imposers of Subscription exprest in the Corporation Act. But it is only the 〈◊〉 of Church Government which the present Controversie is about And if all that was said against our Prelacy on the first Controversie prove it a Duty to endeavour an alteration of the Church-Government then the Controversie is at an end § 364. 3. They say That all Men confess that an Oath and Vow is obligatory in a lawful matter though it were not antecedently necessary But whether in their Places and Callings to endeavour an alteration of the Church-Government be not lawful is the question Here 1. let it be observed what the matter of the Vow is 2. Who be the Persons whose Obligations are in question 1. The matter of the Vow was not to extirpate Episcopacy in general nor the Primitive Episcopacy in particular but only the fore described English Diocesan Prelacy in Specie which I prove beyond all denial 1. Because that which was not in being in England could not be extirpated out of England But it was
which the People cannot know nor are bound to search after The words of the Vow it self are in our several Places and Callings we shall endeavour And this was the expressed work and end And this was not doing any thing against Law If a discontented Person now should say that the Parliaments End in the Act of Uniformity and that against Conventicles was Persecution and the Suppression of Religion and therefore they are not to be obeyed how would this hold while Uniformity and Peace are the published Ends and the rest are either uncertain or impertinent to us 2. Whether indeed the Imposers Ends were ill is a Controversie fit to be touched by it self They thought such a Change of Church-Government was a good End And for doing it against Law they put not that into the Swearers part in this Clause and proâ—essed the contrary themselves But if they did themselves purpose to do that against to Law which others swear to do in their Places and Calling that is according to Law are those others therefore not obliged to do what they vowed to do according to Law because the Imposers intended to do their part against Law 3. I suppose all the King's Party who took the Oath at their Composition had no ill end in it and are they not then to interpret it by their own Ends as it is their Personal Vow 4. If we reach Men that the bad Ends of the Imposers do disoblige Men from performing Vows materially good take heed left it follow that it will disoblige them much more from obeying Commands and Laws materially good And then every Subject will take himself to be disobliged who is but confident that Persecution Oppression c. were his Rulers Ends. What if a Man for evil Ends command me to obey the King or to worship God or to give to the Poor Or make me swear to do all this Doth not my Vow oblige me because he had evil Ends that drove me to it Nay if I had my self vowed to do all these for some evil end though it is certain that I must not do it to that end yet whether the change of my End does disoblige me also from my Vow as to the Matter is a difficult question which I think Casuists commonly resolve in the Negative But if any Man did mistake their Design and had good Ends himself while theirs were bad yea and the End commanded him were good the Case is much plainer 5. Who can say that the King had an ill End in taking it Or that his Place and Calling did not impower him to do that which in a Subject would have been illegal and that he may not lawfully endeavour accordingly And whereas it is said That the very War it self expounded their meaning who imposed it they being then in Arms against the King It is answered by the Non-Subscribers 1. That they openly professed to take up Arms only against Delinquent Subjects according to Law 2. That their misapplication made not good words to be bad to others 3. That if they make me swear to do it in my Place and Calling I am not obliged to expound this to be out of my Place and Calling because they go out of their Place and Calling And whereas it is said That the Bishops were part of the Parliament and so of the Civil Government â— It is answered 1. That the Parliament declared that they were no Constitutive Essential Unchangeable Part without whom the Acts of both Houses were invalid They were but part of the Lords House where they might be over-voted 2. The Scruple of the Non-Subscribers is not at all whether they are obliged to endeavour to dispossess them of their Baronies or Places in Parliament which is in the power of the King to give them but only about their Ecclesiastical Power and Government as here formed And if it could be proved that the Covenant intended both the Ejection of them from their Church Power and their Places in Parliament it followeth not that it obligeth not to the lawful act because it obligeth not to the unlawfulâ— 3. Nor can it easily be proved unlawful for the King and Parliament either to make a separation of these Powers or to take both from them and so set up the Primitive sort of Bishops either with or without any Civil Authority Abbots had once also a place in Parliament and yet they are now taken down it is supposed not unlawfully The King himself doth lawfully make Members of both Houses by making Earls and Barons and by giving Corporations power to choose Burgesses who before had none And as the new making of these so the excluding of some Members may be without any change in the Form of Civil Government Certainly many Fathers and Canons are against the Civil Government of the Clergy § 372. 2. The second objection is That the Authority of the Imposers was null as to that Act Answ. That is a distinct Controversie which here I shall pass by But granting it to be so no more will follow but that the People were not bound by any Command of theirs to take it But a Vow that is taken in my Closet without any Man's imposition or knowledge may be obligatory or one that a Robber forceth me to by the High-way The nullity of the Obligâ—â—on to take it is all that followeth the nullity of their Authority which will not infer the nullity of the Obligation to keep it for it maketh it but equal to a Vow which is made of a private Will without any Command of Authority at all § 373. 3. The third Reason which most nearly toucheth the Controversie is That the Matter vowed to extirpate Prelacy was unlawful both as against the Laws of God and of the Land Answ. If this be proved no doubt but the Obligation is void and of no effect But 1. It is before proved to be far from being against the Law of God to alter this Prelacy by warrantable means And also that it is not against the Law of the Land for Subjects modeâ—â—y to petition or Parliament Men to speak or the King and Parliament to change which are the Actions which belong to their Places and Callings And if it had been expresly part of the matter of that Vow to do this by unlawful means the question is Whether this can disoblige the Swearer from the lawful part adjoying which is to do it in their Places and Callings Whatever other matter is this matter is not yet proved to be unlawful § 374. Object But Episcopacy is Jure Divino and the Covenant mentioneth the extarpatien of Prelacy which is of the same Species with the other Episcopacy And therefore it is to be understood as to the extirpation of all Episcopacy and so not obligatory Answ. 1. It is before proved that our Prelacy is not of Divine Right but against it 2. And that it differeth even specically from the Primitive Episcopacy 3. But that 's nothing to the
my Lord there are other Fruits of it which I am not altogether hopeless of Receiving When I am commanded to pray for Kings and all in Authority I am allowed the Ambition of this Preferment which is all that ever I aspired after to live a quiet and peaceable Life in all Godliness and Honesty Diu nimis habitavit anima mea inter osores pacis I am weary of the Noise of contentious Revilers and have oft had Thoughts to go into a Foreign Land if I could find any where I might have a healthful Air and quietness that I might but Live and Die in peace When I sit in a Corner and meddle with no Body and hope the World will forget that I am alive Court City and Country is still fill'd with Clamours against me and when a Preacher wanteth Preferment his way is to Preach or write a Book against the Nonconformists and me by Name So that the Menstrua of the Press and Pulpits of some is some Bloody Invectives against my self as if my Peace were inconsistent with the Kingdom 's Happiness And never did my Eyes read such impudent Untruths in Matter of Fact as these Writings contain and they cry out for Answers and Reasons of my Nonconformity while they know the Law forbiddeth me to answer them Unlicensed I expect not that any Favour or Justice of my Superiours should Cure any of this But 1. If I might but be heard speak for my self before I be judged by them and such things believed For to contemn the Judgment of my Rulers is to dishonour them 2. I might live quietly to follow my private Study and might once again have the use of my Books which I have not seen these ten Years and pay for a Room for their standing at Kiderminster where they are eaten with Worms and Rats having no security for my quiet Abode in any place enough to encourage me to send for them And if I might have the Liberty that every Beggar hath to Travel from Town to Town I mean but to London to over-fee the Press when any thing of mine is Licensed for it And 3. If I be sent to Newgate for Preaching Christ's Gospel For I dare not sacrilegiously renounce my Calling to which I am Consecrated per Sacramentum Ordinis if I have the Favour of a better Prison where I may but walk and write These I should take as very great Favours and acknowledge your Lordship my Benefactor if you procure them For I will not so much injure you as to desire or my Reason as to expect any greater Matters no not the Benefit of the Law I think I broke no Law in any of the Preachings which I am accused of and I most confidently think that no Law imposeth on me the Oxford-Oath any more than any Conformable Minister and I am past doubting the present Mittimus for my Imprisonment is quite without Law But if the Justices think otherwise now or at any time I know no Remedy I have yet a License to Preach publickly in London-Diocess under the Arch-bishop's own Hand and Seal which is yet valid for occasional Sermons tho' not for Lectures or Cures But I dare not use it because it is in the Bishop's power to recall it Would but the Bishop who one would think should not be against the Preaching of the Gospel not re-call my License I could preach occasional Sermons which would absolve my Conscience from all Obligations to private Preaching For 't is not Maintenance that I expect I never received a Farthing for my Preaching to my Knowledge since May 1 1662. I thank God I have Food and Raiment without being chargeable to any Man which is all that I desire had I but leave to Preach for nothing and that only where there is a notorious Necessity I humbly Crave your Lordship's Pardon for the tediousness and again return you my very great Thanks for your great Favours remaining My Lord Your Lordship 's Humble Much Obliged Servant Richard Baxter Iune 24. 1670. One Reason more also as additional moveth me That the People of Scotland would have such jealous Thoughts of a Stranger especially at this time when Fame hath rung it abroad that I Conform that I should do little good among them and especially when there are Men enough among themselves that are able if Impediments were removed Another Letter to the E. of Lauderdale I Scarce account him worthy the Name of a Man much less of an English-man and least of all of a Christian who is not sensible of the great Sinfulness and Calamity of our divided and distracted Condition in his Majesty's Dominions The Sin is a Compendium of very many heinous Crimes The Calamity is 1. The King 's to have the trouble and peril of Governing such a divided People 2. The Kingdom 's to be as Guelphes and Gibelines hating and reviling one another and living in a Heart-War and a Tongue-War which are the Sparks that usually kindle a Hand-War and I tremble to think what a Temptation it is to Secret and to Foreign Enemies to make Attempts against our Peace and to read Infallibility it self pronouncing it a Maxim which the Devil himself is practically acquainted with That a House or Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand 3. The Churches To have Pastors against Pastors and Churches against Churches and Sermons against Sermons and the Bishops to be accounted the perfidiousest Enemies of the People's Souls and the Wolves that devour the Flock of Christ and so many of the People to be accounted by Bishops to be Rebellious Schismaticks and Fanaticks whose Religiousness and Zeal is the Plague of the Church and whose ruine or depression is the Pastor's Interest against whom the most vicious may be imployed as being more trusty and obedient to the Orders of the Church How doleful a Case is it that Christian Love and delight in doing good to one another is turned almost every where into wrath and bitterness and a longing after the downful of each other and to hear in most Companies the edifying Language of Love and Christianity turned into most odious Descriptions of each other and into the pernicious Language of Malice and Calumny It is to sober Men a wonderful sort of wickedness that all this is so obstinately persisted in even by those that decry the evil of it in others And to one sort all seemeth justified by saying that others are their Inferiours and to the other by saying that they are Persecuted And 't is a wonderful sort of Calamity which is so much loved that in the face of such Light and in the fore-sight of such Dangers and in the present Experience of such great Concussions and Confusions the Peace-killers will not hold their hands My Lord Many sober By-standers think That this Sin might cease and this misery be healed at a very easie Rate and therefore that it is not so much Ignorance as Interest that hindereth the Cure And they wonder who those Persons
required but I think it should be the Congregation's And what if the Elders dissent Shall that hinder the Relation or not 93. The number of chosen Ministers in National Synods will be inconsiderable as to the rest 96. The use of a National Synod where all Bishops and Moderators are chosen by the King and the Commissioner ruleth being before-hand resolved to be to Compile a Liturgy and Rules for all Points of Divine Worship with the Methods Circumstances and Rites to be observed therein Many knowing what Liturgy Subscriptions Declarations and Rites are pleasing to Authority in England will imagine them in fierâ— if not virtually set up already in Scotland when these Rules are set up 107. Publick Pennance And why not and Suspension from Communion till penitent Confession be made But I know not why Compensations should serve instead of Confession and Promise of Reformation without which Money will not make a Man a Christian nor fit for Church-Communion But for any other Pennance besides one penitent Confession and Promise of Amendment and desire of the Churches Prayers for Pardon I know nothing of it and therefore meddle not with it 132. No Act Order nor Constitution may be Expounded to reach to Scripture Constitutions and Orders and the proper Acts of the Ministerial Office if not better explained 133. The Word Ecclesiastical Meeting may be interpreted of particular Synaxes or Congregations of a Parish for Worship if not limited which Convocating of the People is part of the Pastor's proper Office and for a thousand Years was so accounted by the Catholick Church And if in case of Discord or Heresie a few Neighbour Ministers meet for a Friendly Conference to cure it it seemeth hard to charge them with Sedition 140. If the Parties be able to come 143. Many of these Faults should be Corrected by Mulcts before Men be forbidden to Preach the Gospel If every Man be Suspended which I suppose is prohibiting him to Preach and Endeavour Mens Salvation who useth unsound Speeches Flattery or Lightness I doubt so many will talk themselves into Silence that a sharp Prosecution will leave many Churches desolate 145. But what if there be no Preachers to be had May not the Suspended Preach 146. Disobedience to some of the small Ecclesiastical Rules may be punished with Mulcts without absolute Silencing especially when able Preachers are wanting Shall the instructing of the Peoples Souls so much depend on every Word in all these Canons But oh that you would make that good in Practice that Labouring to get Ecclesiastical Preferment should be punished if it were with less than Deposition It would be a happy Canon 147. But shall the Synod or Presbytery carry by Vote or not 149. If every Church-Session have this power of Suspension with power but to say We declare you unfit for Communion of this particular Church till you repent it would give me great Satisfaction were I in Scotland For to speak freely I take these two Things to be of Divine Appointment 1. That each particular Church have its proper Pastor who have the Ministerial Power of Teaching Worship Sacraments Prayer Praise and Discipline and I desire no more Discipline than you here grant that is Suspension from Communion in that particular Church if also the Person may be declared unfit for it till he Repent 2. That these Pastors hold such Correspondency as is necessary to the Union of the Churches in Faith and Love And 3. For all the rest I take them to be Circumstances of such prudential Determination that I would easily submit to the Magistrates determination of them so they be not destructive to the Ends and would not have Ministers take too much of the trouble of them upon themselves without necessity 152. But then you seem here to retract the particular Churches Power again For if a Man may be debarred the Communion for once sinning by Fornication Drunkenness c. why not much more for doing again after Repentance I differ more from this than all the rest Is it not enough that the Party may Appeal to the Presbytery And that the Sessions or Pastor be responsible for Male-Administration or Injury if proved This one Canon would drive me out of the Ministry in Scotland I would never be a Pastor where I must after the first Crime ever after give the Sacrament to every flagitioâ—s Offender till the Presbytery suspend him unless they do it very quickly which perhaps they may never do 153 154. No doubt but Iure Divino every true particular Church hath the Power of Excommunicating its own Members out of that particular Church-Communion Delivering up to Satan is a doubtful Phrase which I shall not stand on But an Excommunication which shall bind many Churches to avoid the Sinner must be done or Consented to by those many Churches Therefore Excommunication should be distinguished 156. Sure some few Ecclesiastical Rules and Proceedings may be so low as that a Contempt of them may be easilyer punished than with this terrible Excommunication Impenitency must be joyned with Scandalous Sins or else they make not the Person Excommunicable as is implyed in what followeth 162. No doubt but every Church may absolve its own Members from that sort of Excommunication which it self may pass And so may a Presbytery But if the Magistrate will have a more formidable Diocesane or National Excommunication and an answerable Absolution those Circumstances are to be left to his Prudence so be it he deprive not each particular Pastor and Church of their proper Power and Priviledge plainly found in Scripture and used many hundred Years through the Catholick Church Honourable Sir The Copy which you sent me goeth no further than to the Visitation of the Sick viz. to Can. 176. And so much according as I was desired I have freely and faithfully Animadverted And in general here are many excellent Canons though of many things I cannot Judge and those few Exceptions I humbly offer to your Consideration craving your Pardon for this boldness which I should not have been guilty of if the worthy Messenger had not told me that it was your desire Sir I rest Your Humble Servant Rich. Baxter Iuly 22. 1670. § 173. I had forgotten one passage in the former War of great remark which put me into an amazemeut The Duke of Ormond and Council had the cause of the Marquess of Antrim before them who had been one of the Irish Rebels in the beginning of that War when in the horrid Massacre two hundred thousand Protestants were murthered His Estate being sequestred he sought his restitution of it when King Charles II. was restored Ormond and the Council judged against him as one of the Rebels He brought his cause over to the King and affirmed that what he did was by his Father's Consent and Authority The King referred it to some very worthy Members of his Privy-Council to examine what he had to shew Upon Examination they reported that they found that he had
consult about such a work and if so that more than I may be consulted and nothing laid on me alone I am confident were but Dr. Stillingfleet Dr. Tillotson or any such moderate Men appointed to consult with two or three of us on the safe and needful terms of Concord we should agree in a Week's time supposing them vacant for the Business I Rest Your humble Servant Richard Baxter Decem. 15. 1673. The means of uniting the Protestant Ministers in England and healing our lamentable Divisions supposing Church-Government may not be altered 1. About Engagements Let no other Covenant Promise Oath Declaration or subscription be necessary to Ministers for Ordination Institution Induction Ministration or Possession of their maintenance nor to Scholars at the Universities except the ancient University Oath or to School-masters besides the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the subscribing the Doctrine and Sacraments of the Church of England as expressed in the thirty nine Articles accordingly to the 13th of Queen Elizabeth and the common Subscription approving the Doctrine of the Homilies and this following Declaration against Rebellion and Sedition I. A. B. do hold that it is not Lawful for His Majesty's Subjects upon any Pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King his Person or Authority or against any Authorized by his Legal Commission And that there lyeth no Obligation on me or any other of his Subjects from the Oath commonly called the solemn League and Covenant to endeaveavour any Change of the present Government of these his Majesty's Kingdoms nor to endeavour any Reformation of Church or State by Rebellion Sedition or any other unlawful means II. Because the Churches are all supposed to have Incumbents and the present Non-conformists being devoted to the sacred Ministry do holn it high Sacriledge to alienate themselves therefrom to pass by their outward wants till by Presentations to vacant Churches they are better provided let them have liberty to be School-masters or assistants to Incumbents or to Preach Lectures in their Churches so it be by their Consent whether they be Lectures already endowed with some Maintenance or such as the People are willing to maintain And let not the Incumbents be discouraged by the Bishops from receiving them And let such places as being convenient are already possessed by them for God's Publick Worship be continued to that use as Chappels till they can be thus received into Benefices or Lectures III. Because the Piety of Families must keep up very much of the Interest of Religion in the World and Multitudes especially in the Country that cannot read can do little or nothing of it in their own Families and may be greatly helped by joyning with their more understanding pious Neighbours let it not be forbidden to any who attend the publick Assemblies at any other hours to join with their Neighbours being of the same Parish who read the Holy Scriptures and Licensed pious Books and repeat the publick Sermons and Pray and Praise God by singing Psalms and refuse not the Inspection of their lawful Pastors herein Nor let it not be unlawful for any stablished Minister to receive his People in such Work or for the Catechising and personal instructing of such as shall desire it IV. Concerning the Liturgy and publick Communion 1. Let no Man be punished for omitting the use of the Liturgy if in the Congregation where he is incumbent the greatest part of it appointed for that time be sometimes as once a quarter or half a Year as the Canon requireth used by himself and every Lord's Day ordinarily unless when sickness or other Necessity hindreth either by himself or by his Curate or Assistant And let none be forced to read the Apocrypha publickly for Lessons 2. Let no meer Lecturer be forced to read the the Liturgy himself or to procure another to read it seeing it is the Incumbent's Charge and it is supposed it will be done Or if this may not be granted let the Lecturer be only obliged once half a Year which is the time limited in the Canon to read the Greatest part of it appointed for that time 3. Let not Christian Parents be forbidden to dedicate their Children publickly to God by entering them into the Christian Covenant professing and undertaking on their Behalf that which belongeth to Parents in that Case And let not the Parents be forced to get such Godfathers and Godmothers as are Atheists Infidels Hereticks or grosly ignorant what Baptism and Christianity is or as for their wicked Lives are themselves justly kept from the Communion nor such as they know have no intention to do what they are to undertake And if any Christian Parent can get no better to undertake that Office many now scrupling it and none can be forced to it let not his Child be denied Baptism if he be ready to do the Office of a Parent himself 4. Seeing some Ministers think that the use of the transient Image of the Cross as a Sacramental or dedicating Sign In the Baptismal Covenant and a Symbol of the Christian Profession is a breach of the second Commandment â—et not such be forced to use it nor to refuse to baptize the Children of such Persons without it who are of the same Mind 5. Let no Minister be forced against his Judgment to baptize any Child both whose Parents avoid or are justly denied the Communion of the Church unless sâ—me Person who communicateth with the Church do take the Child as his own und undertake to Educate it according to the Christian Covenant 6. Let none be forced to receive the Sacrament who through Infidelity Heresie or Prophaneness is unwilling till the hinderance be removed Nor any who by Consciousness or fear of their unfitness are like to be driven by so receiving it into distraction or desperation 7. Let no Minister be forced to deliver the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood to any who is unbaptized or who being baptized in Infancy did never yet personally to the Church or Minister own his Baptismal Covenant by an understanding Profession of the Christian Faith and promise of Obedience to God the Father Son and Holy-Ghost and who also will not yet make such a profession and promise to the Church or Minister or else bring a valid Certificate that he hath formerly done it to the Bishop or some approved Pastor under whom he lived Nor to any who upon accusation fame or just suspicion of Atheism Infidelity Heresie intolerable Ignorance or gross and heinous Sin doth refuse to come speak with the Minister for his satisfaction and his Justification or better Information or who by Proof or Confession is found guilty of any of the aforsaid scandalous Evils until he have professed serious Repentance to the said Minister if the crime be notorious and if he refuse till he have moreover amended his former wicked Life 8. Let no Minister be forced to publish an Excommunication or Absolution of any against his Conscience upon the decree or
it exposeth the Magistrate to the reproach or Contempt of the Subjects and so shaketh the very frame of the Kingdom or Government The Magistrate's honour for the good of the Kingdom is more necessary than his Dishonour and shame can be to the Order of that particular Church 2. And a suspending of the Pastor's Act of delivering him the Sacrament with an humble admonition may better attain the Lawful end 3. Christ himself hath oft taught us this Exposition of his Law When he did eat with Publicans and sinners he preferred their repentance before the positive Order of not being familiar with such as being never intended in such a Case When the Disciples pluck't the Ears of Corn and himself cured the sick on the Sabbath day he proveth that the positive Law of Rest was intended to give place to the Moral Law of Necessity and Charity and proveth it by the instance of David and the Officiating Priests and twice sendeth the contrary minded Pharisees to learn what that meaneth I will have mercy a Natural Duty and not at that time sacrifice a positive institution And they that will pretend a positive Law of Order for a Congregation to the dishonouring of Kings and Iudges and Magistrates and making them contemptible and so unable to govern do Pharisaically set up Positives against natural moral Duties By which means Popes and Patriarchs and other Prelates have wronged Princes and troubled the world too much already Do you no better justifie the Common slander how much the Non-conformists are against the honour of Magistrates in comparison of the Church of England I know some Non-conformists think as you but others do not See the old Non-conformists judgment against excommunicating Kings in a Latin Treat De vera Genuina Christ. Relig. Authore Ministro Anglo An. 1618. pag. 280. 4. Moreover the execution of the sentence of Excommunication on Princes and Rulers will less consist with the honour that is due to them than the sentence it self For to avoid them that they may be ashamed to turn away from not to be familiar with them to keep them out of the Church at all God's special Church-worship are things that we cannot do without neglect of much of our duty to them We must attend them and obey them with honour I know a General Council hath forbidden Bishops to carry themselves with Lowliness at the tables and in the presence of Princes and great men And I know that some think that Excommunicate Princes have forfeited their honour and it is lawful to dishonour them yea and all wicked Princes who deserve Excommunication and I know Mr. Hooker in his Eccles. Polit. saith that it is supposed that a Prince that is the Head of a Christian Church be himself a Christian But all these are Errours tending to the subversion of Order and Government And the Higher Powers whom God's Spirit commandeth us to honour and be subject to were Nero and the Roman Senate and other Enemies of Christianity even Idolatrous Heathens And if these must be honoured much more a Christian King or Judge who were he a private man might deserve an Excommunication At least I hope that the Writ de Excommunicato Capiendo shall not be issued out against the King or his Judges though the Canon 65. command that every six months in Cathedrals and Parish-Churches the Excommunications be declared of those that obstinately refuse to frequent the Divine Service established by publick Authority and those especially of the better sort and Condition who for notorious contumacy or other notable Crimes stand Excommunicate c. Though the Better sort are singled out especially for the sentence and shame yet if it should be Judges and Sheriff who shall Judge and apprehend them Prop. id Not silence suspend c. Arbitrary but by a known Law Strict No Bishops do or can do so Neither is there any Law or Canon to that purpose that I know of Answ. I am loth to Name Iustances lest it provoke Mr. Potter is dead Dr. Willes of Kingsion now Chaplain to the King they say I am sure hath complained much of his suspension at Shadwell I remember Bishop Reighnolds was so sensible of the necessity of this Provision that at the Savoy Treaty he was most earnest to have it inserted and insisted on It may be it is Minister's ignorance in the Law that maketh them when suspended not know where to seek for a remedy unless in vain or to their undoing Postscript If Sacraments were left free c. It would take in the Independents c. Strict If Independents may be taken in by us now why did not you take them in when you were in power but preach and write so much as you did against Toleration of them But you that would have us dispense to all things now would your selves dispense with nothing then Answ. It 's pity that matters of publick fact should be so much unknown and that when such inference follow 1. I was never in power Nay my Lot never fell out to be of any side that was Vppermost in Church matters nor in State-Usurped power but I always was of the under side 2. It was the Toleration of all Sects unlimitedly that I wrote and preacht against and not that I remember of meer Independents 3. Those that did oppose the Toleration of Independents of my acquaintance did not deny them the liberty of Independency but opposed separation or their Gathering other Churches out of Parish-Churches that had faithful Ministers If they would have taken Parish-Churches on Independent Principles without separation neither I nor my aquaintance did oppose them no nor their Endeavours to reform such Churches 4. The Case greatly differed For an Independent to refuse Parish-Churches when no Ceremony no Liturgie no Oath or Subscription is required of him which he scrupleth is not like his refusing Oaths Subscriptions Liturgie Ceremonies c. 5. But in a Word Grant us but as much and take us but in as we granted to and took in the Independents and we are content Make this agreement and all is ended we desire no more of you We never denyed the Independents the liberty of preaching Lectures as often as they would Nor yet the liberty of taking Parish-Churches They commonly had Presentations and the publick Maintenance And no Subscription Declaration Liturgie or Ceremony was imposed on them Again I say I ask you no more Liberty than was given the Independents by their brethren called Presbyterians Let your Grant now agree but with your intimations 6. And how then say you we would dispence with nothing For my part and those of my mind we never imposed nor endeavoured to impose any thing on any man as necessary to Ordination Ministry or Communion but The owning of the Scripture Generally and the Creeds Lord's Prayer and Decalogue and Sacraments particularly with that measure of understanding them and ability to teach them which is necessary to a Minister and fidelity therein
I was then desired to Communicate it to some Nonconforming Brethren Dr. Manton was gone into the Countrey Dr. Bates was sick I Communicated it to Mr. Iohn Corbet Mr. aâ—ents Mr. Pool Dr. Iacomb and Mr. Humphrey When we had made such further small Corrections as all agreed on Mr. Pool and I were desired to meet the two Doctors for a further procedure They met us and we again read the Draught but would give them no Copy and agreed with them that they should take the present time while Bishop Morley was out of Town as likest to frustrate and to desire Bishop Ward and Bishop Pierson of Chester a Learned sober Man to meet us and to hear what we had agreed on and promise us secrecy Bishop Ward once came in upon us when we were together but withdrew They promised us to try it speedily But when they had only in General told Bishop Ward c. how far we had gone and how fair we were for Agreement and told them some of the particular Materials there was a full end of all the Treaty The Bishops had no further to go We had already carryed it too far Hearing no more of the Doctors we sent to know how the Case went and understood by them that their Hopes and Labours were at an end I sent to Dr. Tillotson to know whether they would give me leave to tell any to promote our Concord how far they agreed with us that their Names might be some advantage to the work And he wrote to me as followeth Apr. 11. 1675. Sir I took the first opportunity after you were with us to speak to the Bishop of Sal. who promised to keep the matter private and only to acqaint the Bishop of Ch. with it in order to a Meeting But upon some General Discourse I plainly perceived several things could not be obtained However he promised to appoint a time of Meeting but I have not heard from him since I am unwilling my Name should be used in this Matter not but that I do most heartily desire an Accommodation and shall always endeavour it But I am sure it will be a prejudice to me and signify nothing to the effecting of the thing which as Circumstances are cannot pass in either House without the Concurrence of a considerable part of the Bishops and the Countenance of His Majesty which at present I see little reason to expect I am Your affectionate Brother and Servant Iohn Tillotson § 288. A short time after told these Doctors what these same Bishops were even then contriving when they cryed up Agreement and set them on this work even to bring things much higher than they were by putting on Oath on the Lords Commons and Magistrates of which more anon But because some would know the Terms which we agreed on I shall here annex the Form to a word only telling them that would understand it 1. That it is not what we would have had we our Choice but what we would possibly hope might have been granted us We had not the least hopes of more 2. That we did not so annex the latter Particulars as if we would not have been glad of the former alone could no more be had For the bare opening of the Door for our Entrance would have done something for a present shift 3. That the passage that shortening Common Prayer in extraordinary Cases should not be punishable had several uses which unless we had opportunity here to open as we debated it cannot be suddenly understood by each Reader And many will say that too much or too little is yielded that know not our Circumstances and hear not our Reasons But it may somewhat satisfy considering Men that both parties did agree in the form here annexed tho the Bishops had rather all our Distractions and Miseries were by the greatest Cruelty continued An Act for the Healing and Concord of his Majestie 's Subject 's in matters of Religion WHereas the Concord and Conjunct Labours of all able Godly Ministers of Christ are of great use to the safety of the true Religion and peace of the Kingdom and the Salvation of their Flocks and Experience proveth that this Concord cannot be now obtained without some Abatement of the terms of Uniformity required by the present Laws Be it enacted by His Majesty c. I. That no other Oath Subscription Declaration Covenant or promise shall henceforth be necessary to or required of any Priests or Deacons for their Ordination Institution Induction License to preach and perform their Office nor of Students in the Universities nor School-Masters besides the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the promises at Ordination of Ministerial fidelity contained in the form of Ordination and the subscribing to the Doctrine and Sacraments of the Church of England according to the statute of Eliz. 13. in the words J. A. B. do unfeignedly assent to the Doctrine of Faith and Sacraments of the Church of England as they are expressed in the Articles of the Church And the Oaths for the proper privileges of the Universities and Colledges and to this following Declaration against Rebellion and Disloyalty J. A. B. do hold that it is not lawful for any of his Majestie 's Subjects upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King his Person Authority or Rights and Dignity nor against any Authorized by his Laws or Legal Commission and that there lyeth no obligation on me or any of his Majestie 's Subjects from the Oath commonly called the solemn League and Covenant to endeavour any Change of the present Government of his Majestie 's Kingdoms nor to endeavour any reformation or alteration of the Church Government as it is not by Law established by Rebellion Sedition or any other unlawful means II. And be it enacted by c. That in such Churches or places of publick worship where the Liturgy is read and the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper accordingly administred by the Incumbent or the Lecturer or Curate or other Minister no other shall be punished for not using it there or for not baptizing or not administring the Lord's Supper provided that such other Minister be oft present at the reading of the Liturgy and that he read it himself at least twice a year and as often baptize Children if offered thereto and administer the Lord's Supper according to the Liturgy if he have cure of Souls Provided that no Minister shall be punished as guilty of Omission for any brevity which is caused unavoidably by sickness weakness or any just extraordinary cause But if otherwise the Liturgy be in any Church disused the Incumbent shall be punishable as is already appointed by the Law And Be it enacted that no Parent shall be forbidden to enter his own Child into Covenant with God in baptism by speaking such promising and undertaking words as by the Liturgy and Canon are now required of the Godfathers and Godmothers alone Nor shall any Minister be forced against
dare not desert it lest we shortly appear before our Judge in the guilt of sacriledge perfidiousness against Christ and the people's Souls But we are forbiden to exercise it unless we will do that which we profess as Men that are passing to our final Doom we would readily do were it not for fear of God's displeasure and our Damnation Deprivation of all Ministerial maintenance with heavy Mulcts on such as have not money to pay and long Imprisonments in the Common Goals with Malefactors and banishment to those that shall survive them and that into remote parts of the World were the penalties appointed for us by your Laws Voluminous reproaches are published against us in which our Superiours and the World are told that we hold that things indifferent are made unlawful by the Commands of lawful Governours and that we are guilty of Doctrines inconsistent with the Peace and Safety of Societies and that we are moved by Pride and Covetousness as if we were proud of Men's Scorn and covetous of sordid Want and Beggery and ambitious of a Gaol and that we are Unpeaceable Disloyal Odious and Intolerable Persons Lest we should seem over-querulous and our Petitions themselves should prove offensive we have been silent under Twelve years sufferings by which divers Learned and holy Divines have been hastened home to Glory hoping that Experience would have effectually spoken for us when we may not Speak for our selves And did we believe that our own pressures were the greatest consequent Evil and that the People's knowledge and piety and the allowed Ministers Number sufficiency and Diligence were such as made our Labours needless and that the History of our Silence and Sufferings would be the future Honour of this Age and the future Comfort of your Souls and theirs that instigate you against us before our Common Judge we would joyfully be silent and accept of a Dismission But being certain of the contrary we do this once adventure humbly to tender to Your Majesty and Your Parliament these following Requests 1. Because God saith That he that hateth his Brother is a Murderer and hath not Eternal Life We humbly crave leave once to Print and Publish the true State and Reasons of our Nonconformity to the World to save Mens Souls from the guilt of unjust Hatred and Calumny And if we err we may be helped to Repentance by a Confutation and the Notoriety of our shame 2. That in the mean time this Honourable House will appoint a Committee to consider of the best means for the Healing our Calamitous Divisions before whom we may have leave at last to speak for our selves 3. That these annexed Professions of our Religion and Loyalty may be received as from Men that better know their own Minds than their Accusers do and who if they durst deliberately Lie should be no Nonconformists 4. That if yet we must suffer as Malefactors we may be punished but as Drunkards and Fornicators are with some Penalty which will consist with our Preaching Christ's Gospel and that shall not reach to the hurt or danger of many Thousand Innocent People's Souls till the Re-building of the Burnt-Churches the lessening of great Parishes where one of very many cannot hear and worship God and till the quality and number of the Conformable Ministers and the knowledge piety and sobriety of the people have truly made our Labours needless and then we shall gladly obey your Silencing Commands And whereas there are commonly reckoned to be in the Parishes without the Walls above Two hundred thousand persons more than can come within the Parish Churches they may not be compelled in a Christian Land to live as Atheists and worse than Infidels and Heathens who in their manner publickly worship God The Profession of our Religion I A. B. Do willingly profess my continued resolved consent to the Covenant of Christianity which I made in my Baptism with God the Father Son and Holy Ghost forsaking the Devil the World and the sinful Lusts of the Flesh And I profess my Belief of the Ancient Christian Creeds called The Apostles The Nicene and The Constantinopolitane and the Doctrine of the Blessed Trinity fullier opened in that ascribed to Athanasius And my Consent to The Lord's Prayer as the Summary of Holy Desires and to The Decalogue with Christ's Institutions as the Summary Rule of Christian Practice And to all the Holy Canonical Scriptures as the Word of God And to the Doctrine of the Church of England professed in the 39 Articles of Religion as in sence agreeable to the Word of God And I renounce all Heresies or Errours contrary to any of these And I do hold that the Book of Common Prayer and of Bishops Priests and Deacons containeth in it nothing so disagreeable to the Word of God as maketh it unlawful to live in the Peaceable Communion of the Church that useth it The Profession of our Loyalty and Obedience I do willingly and without Equivocation and Deceit take the Oaths of Allegiance and the King's Supremacy and hold my self obliged to perform them I detest all Doctrines and Practices of Rebellion and Sedition I hold it unlawful for any of His Majesty's Subjects upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King His Person Authority Dignity or Rights or against any Authorized by his Laws or Commissions And that there is no Obligation on me or any other of his Subjects from the Oath Commonly called The Solemn League and Covenant to endeavour any change of the present Government of these His Majesty's Kingdoms nor to endeavour any Reformation of the Church by Rebellion Sedition or any other unlawful means The Overplus as a remedy against Suspicion We believe and willingly embrace all that is written in the Holy Scriptures for the power of Kings and the Obedience of their Subjects and the sinfulness of Rebellion and Resistance And concerning the same we consent to as much as is found in any General Council or in the Confession of any Christian Church on Earth not respecting Obedience to the Pope which ever yet came to our knowledg or as is owned by the Consent of the Greater part of Divines Politicians Lawyers or Historians in the Christain World as far as our Reading hath acquainted us therewith II. To the King 's most Excellent Majesty The Humble Petition of some Citizens of London on the behalf of this City and the Adjoyning Parishes Sheweth THat the Calamitous Fire 1666 with our Houses and Goods Burnt down near 90 Churches few of which are yet Re-edifyed And divers Parishes whose Churches yet stand are so great that it is but a small part of the Inhabitants that can there hear whereby great Numbers are left in ignorance and as a prey to Papists and other Seducers and which is worse to Atheism Infidelity and Irreligiousness And if many of their ancient ejected silenced Pastors who for refusing certain Subscriptions Declarations Promises Oaths and Practices are called Nonconformists had not through
the King to remove him from all publick Enployment and Trust His chief accusing Witness was Mr. Burnet late Publick-Professor of Theologie at Glascow who said That he askt him whether the Scots Army would come into England and said What if the Dissenting Scots should Rise an Irish Army should cut their Throats c. But because Mr. Burnet had lately magnified the said Duke in an Epistle before a published book many thought his witness now to be more unfavoury and revengefull Every one judging as they were affected But the King sent them Answer That the words were spoken before his late Act of pardon which if he should Violate it might cause jelousies in his Subjects that he might do so also by the Act of Indemnity § 294. Their next Assault was against the Lord Treasurer who found more Friends in the House of Commons who at last acquitted him § 295. But the great work was in the House of Lords where an Act was brought in to impose such an Oath on Lords Commons and Magistrates as is Imposed by the Oxford-Act of Confinement on Ministers and like the Corporation-Oath of which more anon It was now supposed that the bringing the Parliament under this Oath and Test was the great work which the House was to perform The Summ was That none Commissioned by the King may be by Arms resisted and that they would never endeavour any alteration of the Government of Church or State Many Lords spake vehemently against it as destructive to the Privileges of their House which was to Vote freely and not to be preobliged by an Oath to the Prelates The Lord Treasurer the Lord Keeper with Bishop Morley and Bishop Ward were the great Speakers for it And the Earl of Shaftsbury Lord Hollis the Lord Hallifax the D. of Buckingham the Earl of Salisbury the chief Speakers against it They that were for it being the Major part many of the rest Entered their Protestation against it The Protesters the first time for they protested thrice more afterward were the Duke of Buckingham the Marquess of Winchester the Earls of Salisbury Bristol Barkshire § 296. The Protesting Lords having many days striven against the Test and being overvoted attempted to joyn to it an Oath for Honesty and Conscience in these words I do swear that I will never by threats injunctions promises or invitations by or from any person whatsoever nor from the hopes or prospects of any gift place office or trust whatever give my vote other than according to my opinion and conscience as I shall be truly and really perswaded upon the debate of any business in Parliament But the Bishops on their side did cry it down and cast it out § 297. The Debating of this Text did more weaken the Interest and Reputation of the Bishops with the Nobles than any thing that ever befel them since the King came in so much doth unquiet overdoing tend to undoing The Lords that would not have heard a Nonconformist say half so much when it came to be their own case did long and vehemently plead against that Oath and Declaration as imposed on them which they with the Commons had before imposed on others And they exercised so much liberty for many days together in opposing the Bishops and free and bold speeches against their Test as greatly turned to the Bishops Disparagement especially the Earl of Shaftsbury the Duke of Buckingham the Earl of Bristol the Marquess of Winchester the Earl of Salisbury the Lord Hollis the Lord Hallifax and the Lord of Alesbury Which set the Tongues of Men at so much liberty that the common talk was against the Bishops And they said that upon Trial there were so few found among all the Bishops that were able to speak to purpose Bishop Morley of Winchester and Bishop Ward of Salisbury being their chief Speakers that they grew very low also as to the Reputation of their parts § 298. At last though the Test was carried by the Majority yet those that were against it with others prevailed to make so great an alteration of it as made it quite another thing and turned it to the greatest disadvantage of the Bishops and the greatest accommodation of the Cause of the Nonconformists of any thing that this Parliament hath done For they reduced it to these words of a Declaration and an Oath I A. B. do declare That it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King And that I do abhor that Traiterous Position of taking Arms by His Authority against His Person or against those that are Commissioned by him according to Law in time of Rebellion and War in acting in pursuance of such Commission I A. B. do Swear that I will not endeavour an Alteration of the Protestant Religion now established by Law in the Church of England nor will I endeavour any Alteration in the Government of this Kingdom in Church or State as it is by Law Established § 299. This Declaration and Oath thus altered was such as the Nonconformists would have taken if it had been offered them in stead of the Oxford-Oath the Subscription for Uniformity the Corporation and Vestry Declaration But the Kingdom must be Twelve years rackt to Distraction and 1800 Ministers forbidden to Preach Christ's Gospel upon pain of utter ruin and Cities and Corporations all New-Modelled and Changed by other kind of Oaths and Covenants and when the Lords find the like obtruded on themselves they reject it as intolerable And when it past they got in this Proviso That it should be no hinderance to their Free-Speaking and Voting in the Parliament Many worthy Ministers have lost their Lives by Imprisonments and many Hundred their Maintenance and Liberty and that opportunity to serve God in their Callings which was much of the comfort of their Lives and mostly for refusing what the Lords themselves at last refuse with such another Declaration But though Experience teach some that will no otherwise learn it is sad with the World when their Rulers must learn to Govern them at so dear a rate and Countreys Cities Churches and the Souls of Men must pay so dear for their Governours Experience § 300. The following Explication will tell you That there is nothing in this Oath and Declaration to be refused 1. I do declare That it is not lawful can mean no more but that I think so and not that I pretend to Infallible certainly therein 2. To take Arms against the King That is either against his Formal Authority as King or against His Person Life or Liberty or against any of His Rights and Dignity And doubtless the Person of the King is inviâ—â—able and so are His Authority and Rights not only by the Laws but by the very Constitution of the Kingdom For every Common-wealth being essentially constituted of the Pars Imperans and pars subdita materially the Union of these is the Form of it and the Dissolution is the Death of it And
intend only Bishops and King by Church and State 1. It would suppose that King and Parliament do take Bishops and King for two coordinate Heads in governing the Kingdom 2. And that they set the Bishops before the King which is not to be supposed 5. And to put all out of question the Oath is but Conform to former Statutes Oaths Articles of Religion and Canons 1. The Statutes which declare the King to be only Supreme Governour of the Church I need not cite 2. The Oath of Supremacy is well known of all 3. The very first Canon is that the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and all Bishops c. shall faithfully keep and observe all the Laws for the King's Supremacy over the Church of England in causes Ecclesiastical And the 2d Canon is to condemn the dangers of it And the 36. Canon obligeth all Ministers to subscribe that the King's Majesty under God is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm as well in all spiritual and Ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal And as the Parliament are called the Representative of the People or Kingdom as distinct from the Head so the 139. Canon excommunicateth all them that affirm that the Sacred Synod of this Nation in the Name of Christ and by the King's Authority Aslembled is not the true Church of England by Representation So that they claim to be but the Representative of the Church as it is the Body distinct from the Head Christ aud the King as their chief Governour 4. And all that are Ordained are likewise to take the Oath of Supremacy I do utterly testify and declare in my Conscience that the King's Highness is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or Causes as Temporal 5. And It is also inserted in the Articles of Religion Art 35. And it is added expositorily Where we attribute to the Queen's Majesty the Chief Government by which title we understand the minds of some slanderous folks to be offended we give not to our Princes the Ministring either of God's Word or of the Sacraments but that only prerogative which we see to have been given always to all Godly Princes in holy Scriptures by God himself that is that they should rule all Estates and Degrees committed to their Charge by God whether they be Ecclesiastcal or Temporal and restrain with the Civil Sword the Stubborn and evil Doers Here it is to be noted that though no doubt but the Keys of Excommunication and absolution belong to the Pastors and to the Civil Magistrate yet the Law and this Article by the word Government mean only Coercive Government by the Sword and do include the power of the Keys under the title of Ministring the Word and Sacraments Church Guidance being indeed nothing else but the Explication and Application of God's word to Cases and Consciences and administring the Sacraments accordingly So that as in the very Article of Religion Supreme Government appropriated to the King only is contradistinguish'd from Ministring the Word and Sacraments which is not called Government there so are we to understand this Law and Oath And many Learned Men think that Guidance is a fitter name than Government for the Pastor's Office And therefore Grotius de Imper. Sum. Pot. would rather have the Name Canons or Rulers used than Laws as to their Determinations Though no doubt but the name Government may be well applyed to the Pastor's Part so we distinguish as Bilston and other judicious men use to do calling one Government by God's Word upon the Conscience and the other Government by the sword as seconding Precepts with enforcing penalties and Mulcts § 301. While this Test was carrying on in the house of Lords and 500 pounds Voted to be the penalty of the Refusers before it could come to the Commons a difference fell between the Lords and Commons about their priviledges by occasion of two Suits that were brought before the Lords in which two Members of the Commons were parties which occasioned the Commons to send to the Tower Sir Iohn Fagg one of their Members for appearing at the Lords Bar without their consent and four Counsellours Sir Iohn Churchill Sergeant Pemberton Sergeant Pecke and another for pleading there And the Lords Voted it Illegal and that they should be released Sir Iohn Robinson Lieutenant of the Tower obeyed the Commons for which the Lords Voted him a Delinquent And so far went they in daily Voting at each other that the King was fain to Prorogue the Parliament Iune 9. till October 13. there appearing no hope of Reconciling them Which rejoiced many that they rose without doing any further harm § 302. Iune 9. Keting the Informer being commonly detested for prosecuting me was cast in Gaol for Debt and wrote to me to endeavour his Deliverance which I did and in his Letters saith Sir I assure you I do verily believe that God hath bestowed all this affliction on me because I was so vile a wretch as to trouble you And I assure you I never did a thing in my Life that hath so much troubled my self as that did I pray God forgive me And truly I do not think of any that went that way to work that ever God would favour him with his mercy And truly without a great deal of mercy from God I do not think that ever I shall thrive or prosper And I hope you will be pleased to pray to God for me c. § 303. A while before another of the chief Informers of the City and my Accuser Marishall died in the Counter where his Creditors laid him to keep him from doing more harm Yet did not the Bishops change or cease Two more Informers were set on work who first assaulted Mr. Case's Meeting and next got in as hearers into Mr. Read's Meeting where I was Preaching And when they would have gone out to fetch Justices for they were known the doors were lockt to keep them in till I had done and one of them supposed to be sent from Fullum stayed weeping Yet went they straight to the Justices and the week following heard me again as Informers at my Lectures but I have not yet heard of their Accusation § 304. But this week Iune 9. Sir Thamas Davis notwithstanding all his foresaid Warnings and Confessions sent his Warrants to a Justice of the Division where I dwell to distrein on me upon two Judgments for 50 pounds for Preaching my Lecture in New-street Some Conformists are paid to the value of 20 pounds a Sermon for their Preaching and I must pay 20 pounds and 40 pounds a Sermon for Preaching for nothing O what Pastors hath the Church of England who think it worth all their unwearied Labours and all the odium which they contract from the People to keep such as I am from Preaching the Gospel of Christ and to undo us for it as far as they are able though these many years they do not for they cannot
be Schismaticks with them that unite not in their Center or at least be not tyed to union by their ligaments So he is a Schismatick to a Papist that Centers not in the Pope as the Principium unitatis and visible Head of the Church and in the Roman Church as the Heart of the Church Catholick denominating the whole He is a SchismatiÌ„ck with some others that owns not every Order or Ceremony which they maintain For my part I should think that he that 〈◊〉 in â—hrâ—â—t and â—â—â—deth the sound and wholsome Doctrine contained in the Creeds of the Church and maintaineth love and unity with all Christians to the utmost extent of his natural capacity even with all that he is capable of holding Communion with is no Schismatick nor his attempts for that end Schismatical Combinations If there were a Bishop in this Diocess and he should go one way suppose he command that all Church Assemblies be at such a time and all worship in such a form and all the Presbyters and People go another way whether they do well or ill so the thing itself be tollerable and will not meet at the time nor worship God in the form which he prescribeth I should think I were guilty of Schism if I separated from all these Churches and guilty of ungodliness if I wholly forsook and forbore all publick worship of God because I could have none according to the Bishops commanding Much more if there were no Bishop in the Diocess at all This seems to be our case in respect of both Worship and Discipline at least for the most part Is that man guilty of no Schisme nor Impiety who will rather have no Discipline exercised at all on the profane and scandalous but all Vice go without controul and the rage of Mens sins provoke Heaven yet more against us who will rather have no Ministerial Worship of God in Prayer or Praise no Sacraments no Solemn Assemblies to this end no Ministerial Teaching of the people but have all Mens Souls given over to perdition the bread of life taken from their mouths and God deprived of all his Worship then any of this should be done without Bishops That had rather the Church doors were shut up and we lived like Heathens than we should Worship God without a Bishops Commands and that when we have none to command us 3. We distinguish of the necessity of Bishops either it is a necessity ad bene esse for the right ordering of the Church when it may be had or it is a necessity ad esse to the very being of a Church or of Gods Worship without which we may not offer God any publick Service or have any Communion with any Congregation that so doth The former we leave as not fit for our determination and therefore we do not contradict you in it nor seek to draw you to own any Declaration against it The latter we do deny there is no such necessity of Bishops as that God can have no Church without them and that we must rather separate from all our Assemblies and never offer God any publick Worship then do it without them remembring still that we speak of those Bishops whom we are charged with rejecting and not the Pastors of particular Congregations And in this distinction of necessity and in this conclusion I have the consent of the generality of the Protestant Bishops so far as I know to a Man as far as their Writings declare to us their Minds and therefore Episcopal Divines may consent Except to Sect. 2. 1. Whether in this Worcestershire Association whoever will enter into it doth not therein oblige himself to acknowledge those for Presbyters and Pastors of Churches who profess themselves to have been made such in a Church where there are and were Bishops that never denyed them Orders without the Hands Consent or Knowladge of the Bishop yea in a time when Bishops were without any accusation before any Ecclesiastical Superiour Synod or other unheard ejected laid by by their own sheep and Presbyters that owed them obedience Reply to Sect. 2. To your first Question I answer 1. You must distinguish of punishing and ejecting Bishops that deserve it and casting out their Order 2. Between casting out the appurtenances and corruptions which made up the English sort of Prelacie as differing from the Primitive and casting out the Order and Office of Bishops simply in itself 3. Between those Men that do cast them out and those that do not 4. Between a Church that hath Bishops and one that hath none 5. Between them that can have Ordination by them and those that cannot 6. Between those Ministers of this Association that were Ordained by Bishops and those that were not 7. Between the Irregularity and sinfulness or Ordination and the nullity thereof and so between a Minister regularly Ordained and a Minister Irregularly Ordained who is a Minister still Hereupon I answer further in these conclusions 1. That too many of the Bishops lately ejected did deserve it is beyond dispute 2. Whether the Parliament in the state that they were in had not power to punish them by Imprisonment or Ejection as Solemon did Abiathar without an Ecclesiastical Superior or whether the Clergy be exempted from such punishment by the Secular power till they are delivered up to them by the Ecclesiastical Head hath been voluminously disputed in the world already Sutcliffe Bilson Iewel and a multitude more have proved that Kings have power in all Causes and over all Persons as well Ecclesiastical as Civil and that the Pope hath no power of Jurisdiction in England let the Oath of Supremacy judge and if the Metropolitan of Canterbury or the highest Ecclesiastical Power miscarry who shall restrain or eject them but the Civil Power unless we go to the Pope for more acceptable witnesses I commend to you Spalatensis Grotius and Saravia yea Fr. de Victoria and several Parisians The two former one de Republ. Eccles. the other de Imperio summarum potestatum will never be well answered If it be said the King did it not I answer I think the Authority by whom that much was done that we now speak of will be acknowledged sufficient by most that were against the fact and that fought against the Parliament that understood the Laws It was long before the King withdrew 3. Many of those that approved of the Ejection of those unworthy men yet approved not of the dissolution of the Office and such may be many and for ought you know most or all of the Ministers here Associated Though I suppose rather it is otherwise yet while Men do for peace silence their opinions who knows what they are And sure I am many among us had no hand in the downfall of the Bishops and whether any at all be lyable in this to your Charge besides my self whereof more anon I know not most of our Association were in the Universities in the Wars and the rest were some I
grant the Necessity of such Succession yet we need not grant the Nullity of our Calling 2. I deny that the English Bishops much less the Church of England did ever judge it necessary any farther than ad Hominem 1. Because it is apparent that they do ordinarily in their Writings speak against the Papists supposed Necessity of Ordination as I instanced out of some of them in my Book It is known to be a Point wherein the Protestants have commonly opposed the Papists 2. It is known to be but the later declining Generation of Bishops such at Montague Laud and their Confederates most in King Charles his Days very few in King Iames's and scarce any at all in Queen Elizabeth's that do join with the Papists in pleading the Necessity of Succession Even such Men as were as zealous against Queen Elizabeth's Episcopal Protestants as against the Papists at least many of them 3. The rest do expresly mention Succession and confute the Fâ—ble of the Nag's-Head Ordination in Cheapside to prove the Papists Slanderers So much to your Minor 3. If that will not serve I deny your Major All is not necessary that they thought necessary Protestants pretend not to Infallability in Controversals Many more perhaps ten to one at least of the English Clergy held it not necessary unless as aforesaid Ad 2 um Your second Argument hath all the Strength in it or rather shew of Strength â— first we must needs distinguish of your Terms Mediately and Immediately A Constitution may be said to be from Christ mediately either in Respect to a mediating Person or to some mediating Sign only Also it may be said to be mediante persona 1. when the Person is the cause totalâ—â— subordinata constituendi as having himself received the Power from God and being as from himself to convey it unto Man 2. Or when the Person is but Causa per accidens 3. Or when he is only Causa sive qua non vel quatenus impedementa â—emovit vel quatenus ejus Actiones sunt conditiones necessarie And so I answer 1. Immediately in the first absolute Sense excludendo personâ—â— res no Man ever had any Right communicated or Duty imposed on him by God unless perhaps the immediate Impress or supernatural Revelation of the Holy Ghost to some Peophet or Apostle might be said to do this Moses himself had the Ten Commandments written in Stone which were signa mediantia Those that heard God speak if any immediately without Angelical Interposition did receive God's Commands mediante verborum signo So did the Apostles that which they had from the Mouth of Christ. 2. God is so absolutely the Fountain of all Power that no Man can either have or give any Power but derivatively from him and by his Commission Man being no farther the Efficient of Power than he is so constituted of God the general way of his giving it must be by the Signification of God's Will and so far as that can be sufficiently discovered there needs no more to the Conveyance of Power Whether Men be properly efficient Causes of Church Power at all is a very hard Question especially as to those over whom they have no superior governing Power As Spalatensis hath taken great pains to prove that Kings or other Sovereigns of the Common-wealth have their Commission and Power immediately from God though the People sometimes may choose the Man for the Power was not given to the People first and then they give it the King but God lets them name the Man on whom he will immediately confer it so possibly may it be in Ordination of Church-Officers Three ways do Men mediate in the Nomination of the Person 1. When they have Authority of Regiment over others and explenitudine potestatis do convey efficiently to inferior Officers the Power that these have Thus doth the supream Rector of the Commonwealth to his Officers and Ergo they are caled the Kings Officers and he hath the choice of the very Species as well as of the individual Officers Now this way of mediating is not always if at all necessary or possible in the Church for the Papists themselves confess that the Pope is Ordained or authorized without this way of Efficiency for none have a Papal Power to convey to him His Ordination cannot be Actus Superioris And the Council of Trent could not agree whether it were not the Case of all Bishops to hold their Office immediately from Christ though under the Pope or whether they had their Power immediately from the Pope as the prime Seat on Earth of all Church Power who is to convey their Parts to others How the Spanish Bishops held up their Cause is known And it was the old Doctrine of the Church that all Bishops were equal and had no Power one over another but all held their Power directly from Christ as Cyprian told them in the Council of Carthage Add to this that the true old Apostolical Episcopacy was in each particular Church and not over many Churches together I speak of fixed Bishops till the matter becoming too big to be capable of the old Form Corruptio unius fuit generatio alterius and they that upon the increase of Christians should have helpt the Swarm into a new Hive did through natural Ambition of ruling over many retaine divers Churches under their Charge and then ceased to be of the Primitive sort of Bishops Non eadem fuit res non munus idem etiamsi idem nomen retinerent So that truly our Parish Ministers who are sole or chief Pastors of that Church are the old sort of Bishops for as Ambrose and after him Grotius argues qui ante se alterum non habebat Episcopus er at That is in eadem Ecclesia qui superiorem non habet So that not only all Diocesan Bishops but also all Parochial Bishops are Ordained per pares and so not by a governing Communication of Power which is that second way of Ordination when men that are of equal Authority have the Nomination of the Person Now whether or no he that ordaineth an Inferior as a Deacon or any other do convey Authority by a proper Efficiency as having that first in himself which he doth Convey yet in the Ordination of Equals it seems not to be so for they have no Government over the particular Persons whom they Ordain or Churches to whom they Ordain them nor could they themselves exercise that governing Power over that other Congregation which they appoint another to so that they seem to be but Causae Morales or sine quibus non as he that sets the Wood to the Fire is of its burning or as he that openeth you the Door is of your bringing any thing into the House So that if you will call the Ordainer of an Inferior causam equivocam and the Ordainer of an Equal causam univocam yet it is but as they morally and improperly cause The Third way of Mediating in the
Ireland and England had made those Muâ—ders and Devastations which no true Christian dare own III. At this day the Light of clear found Doctrine is obscured and such Preaching silenced or ceased in most of the Christian Churches on Earth Besides the bloody Persecutions which met those honest Jesuits and Fryars that preached in Congo Iapan China and other Heathen Lands In Abassia Egypt Syria Assyria Armenia there is very little Preaching at all yea want of Printing keepeth them without the holy Scripture which is rare and in few hands Turkish Oppression hath so debased the Greek Church that sound Preaching is rare among them In all the Empire of Muscovy Preaching is long ago put down lest Men should preach Sedition Among most Papists and Protestants beyond Sea it is turned too much into Invectives against one another This is the Success of Satan's War IV. Being vowed doâ—bly to Christ in my Baptism and Ordination I had been a 〈◊〉 Traytor against him 〈◊〉 I had not hated this Sin and done my part in my place against it There is no Age or Land so good where Christ and 〈◊〉 Light and Darkness have not this War and Secular Interests or Quarrels are made Satan's Advantages who pretendeth to great Power in Disposing of the Riches and Honours of the World This War ended not in England with Queen Mary's Regin The unhappy Differences of Frankford came over with the Exiles One Paâ—â—ty running into Extreams against Episcopacy and the Liturgy and the other forbidding not only them but all Ordained Ministers to preach or expound any Doctrine or Matter in the Church or elsewhere without further Licence I lived to see so much of the Effects of these Differences as grieved my Soul Excellent Preachers and of Holy Lives mistakingly censorious against some lawful Things and Silenced for it some flying to America and some absconding here I saw the diseased Passions and Divisions thus caused and how much it extinguished Christian Love At last we all saw it break out into the Flames of an odious War And even the Usurpers that by Silencers pretended their Provocation fell into the Crime which they Accused and cast out many Learned Bishops Doctors and Preachers for refusing their Covenant and their Engagement and their Way of Worship and for being against their War Thus Satan's Silencing work went on When Experience and Smart brought most Men to their Wits and they had found that a divided Kingdom cannot stand and that returning to Love and Unity must be our Recovery I laboured with Ministers of each side with all my power for Agreement on such Terms as we were then capable of and that was to joyn in the amicable practice of all that they were agreed in and to bear with one another in the rest which were no necessary things On these Terms Worcâ—stershâ—re and seven or eight other Counâ—iâ—s quickly agreed Ireland profest consent More were closing But the Divisions of the Usurpers and the begun Reconciliation of the Peace-makers or Pretenders presently restored the King Men were then variously affected between hope of Unity and fear of Discord and of the old Silencing dividing Work That we had one lawful King to Unite in who promised his help hereunto and declared his Judgment for necessary Indulgence and that Lords and Knights printed their professed Renunciation of Revenge and Doctors professed Moderation did greatly raise Mens hopes that there would be no more such Divisions as should Silence faithful Ministers But they that knew how hardly Love and Moderation are restored after the Exasperations oâ— so odious a War and how few conquer Worldly Interest and old Opinions and do as they would be done by feared that still the Silencing Work would be carried on I was certain that good Men would not be united by coming all over to the Opinions of each other which Party soever was in the right in all the Points called Indifferent by some and Sinful by others I knew the Difference would continue And it doth so I knew that those that were most obedient to God would not do that which they judged he forbad them I knew that if for this they were forbidden to Worship God in Church-Worship they would not forbear till Suffering disabled them I knew that there were so many such and the Suffering that disabled them must be so great that the Land thereby must needs be divided into the Afflicting and Afflicted Parties And the more conscionable the more constant would they be It were well if most understood all things necessary But that all should understand all indifferent things that might be commanded to be indifferent I knew would never be if all the Land were Doctors It was easie to know what Exasperations of Mind all this would cause and what a Conqueâ—â— Satan would make here against Light Love and Mercy that is against Christ. In the deep Sense of this Danger I set my self to try whether Terms of Possiblâ— Câ—â—cord might be obtained The London Ministers joyned The King greatly encouraged us First by his Declaration at Breda and that against Debauchery Next by Personal Engaging us in a Treaty with the Bishops and his Promise that he would draw them to meet us if we would come as near them as we could Then by his gracious Declaration and the Testimony there given of our Loyalty and Moderation Then by his Commission to treat for Alterations of the Liturgy 〈◊〉 the Bishops denied the Need of any Alterations and dasht all our Hopes And 〈…〉 and Parliament cast by the King's Indulgence and issued all in 〈…〉 Uniformity I was the more earnest to have prevented this because I knew not but that most of the whole Ministry of the Kingdom might have been Silenced in one day I knew what was said against much that is imposed And I knew that near Ten thousand Ministers had Conformed to what the Parliament had imposed and most taken the Covenant and used the Directory and not the Common Prayer And how knew I that only Two thousand would stick at the New Impositions and Seven thousand obey them and Assent and Consent to the New Book which they mostly never saw it coming not out of the Press till too late V. While I was engaged in this Treaty by the King the Bishops denied all further Debates with us till we had given them in Writing all the Faults that we found in the Liturgy and all that we desired in stead or as Additions So that we did by Authority and Demand write and deliver as our Proposal before so our Desires and Reasons of the mentioned Alterations and a long and humble Petition to prevent the foreseen Breach and our Reformed Liturgy and Reply to their contrary Reasons which some Scribes for gain after printed I knew not who with abundance of Errata VI. After this 1663. the King revived our hope in part by a Declaration of his Judgment and Purpose for our Leave to Preach and Worship God VII In this
Ministers can perform and it is a work that I never yet knew one Prelatist well perform to my remembrance and few of them meddle with it at all any farther than to read Common Prayer some time to a dying Man if any one of a Multitude desire it 2. Many of them had Pastoral Charges in Cities and Corporations from the obligation of which they take not themselves to be well released by the bare prohibition of Man while then Peoples needs and desires continue and where their places are supplyed with Men so ignorant and vicious as to be un-meet for such a charge of Souls And it must be more than the Will of Man that must warrant them to fly and forsake their Flocks to which they had a lawful Call and to leave their Souls to those notorious Perils as in very many places they must do 3. And in the rest of the Land where can a Minister labour with advantage but with those that know him and are known of him and have formerly profited by him and will afford him Entertainment 4. If it be lawful to desert the Souls of all Cities and Corporations and all other Parishes where-ever we preach'd it will follow that it is lawful to desert all the rest and so sacrilegiously to desert our office 5. Christ saith When they persecute you in one City fly to another Therefore we are not obliged to desert them all as soon as we are commanded 6. The Preaching of Christ's Apostles and of all his Ministers for 300 Years was against the will of the Princes and Rulers of the Countries where they preached And yet they planted Churches and ordained Elders principally in all the Cities where they came and would rather suffer Imprisonment and Death than to desert them any further than by flying from one to another § 9. 2. But natural necessity also constrained many For many had Wives and many Children to maintain and had not one Penny of yearly Revenue nor any thing but the Gifts of charitable People to maintain them And if they had a poor Cottage to live in and no Money to pay their Rent nor to buy Fire Food or Cloathing they had much less enough to take another House and pay for the removal of their Goods far off and the Charges of a new Settlement and there to dwell among Strangers far from those whose Charity relieved them was but to turn their Families to famish which is more inhumane than to see a Brother have need and to shut up the Bowels of our compassion from him which yet is contrary to the Love of God § 10. And indeed in many Countries it was hard to find many places which were not within five Miles of some Corporation or of some place where we had Preached before for some Ministers preached in a great number of Parishes at several times And if such a place were found was it like that there would be Houses enough found untenanted to receive so many Ministers Or if there were perhaps the Landlords would be so much for Prelacy as to refuse such Tenants or so timorous as to be afraid lest by receiving such they should bring themselves under Suspicion of favouring Non-conformists and so be ruined or so covetous as knowing their advantage to ask more for their Houses than poor Ministers that had hardly any thing left to subsist on could be able to give Besides that almost all Country Houses are annexed to the Farms or Land belonging to them And Ministers are ill Farmers especially when they have no Money to Stock their Land § 11. Yea they allowed them not to be kept as common Beggars on the Alms of the Parish but when by the Law every Beggar is to be brought to the place of his Birth or last abode and there to be kept on Alms No Minister must come within five Miles of the Parish where he ever exercised his Ministry nor any that were born in Cities and Corporations must come within five Miles of them for relief § 12. In this strait those Ministers that had any Maintenance of their own did find out some Dwellings in obscure Villages or in some few Market-Towns which were no Corporations And those that had nothing did leave their Wives and Children and hid themselves abroad and sometimes came secretly to them by night But God bringing Good out of Men's Evil many resolved to preach the more freely in Cities and Corporations till they went to Prison Partly because they were then in the way of their Calling in which they could suffer with the greater peace and partly because they might so do some good before they suffered and partly because the People much desired it and also were readier to relieve one that laboured for them than one that did nothing but hide himself and partly because when they lay in Prison for preaching the Gospel both they and their Wives and Children were like to find more pity and relief than if they should forsake their People and their Work Seeing therefore the Question came to this Whether Beggary and Famine to themselves and Families with the deserting of their Callings and the People's Souls was to be chosen or the faithful performance of their Work with a Prison after and the People's Compassion They thought the latter the more eligible § 13. And yet when they had so chosen their Straits were great for the Country was so impoverished that those of the People who were willing to relieve the Ministers were not able And most that were able were partly their Adversaries and partly worldly-minded and strait-handed and unwilling And alas it is not now and then a Shilling or a Crown given very rarely which will pay House-Rent and maintain a Family Those Ministers that were unmarryed did easilier bear their Poverty but it pierceth a Man's Heart to have Children crying and Sickness come upon them for want of wholsom Food or by drinking Water and to have nothing to relieve them And Women are usually less patient of Suffering than Men and their Impatience would be more to a Husband than his own wants I heard but lately of a good Man that was fain to Spin as Women do to get something towards his Family's relief which could be but little and being Melancholy and Diseased it was but part of the Day that he was able to do that Another Mr. Chadwick in Somerset for a long time had little but brown Rye Bread and Water for himself his Wife and many Children and when his Wife was ready to lye in was to be turned out of Door for not paying his House-Rent But yet God did mercifully provide some Supplies that few of them either perished or were exposed to sordid unseemly Beggary But some few were tempted against their former Judgments to Conform § 14. The Oath imposed on them was this I A B De Swear That it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King And that I do abhor
that Traytorous Positon of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are Commissionated by Him in pursuance of such Commission And that I will not at any time endeavour any alteration of Government either in Church or State The Reasons of Men's refusal to take this Oath were such as these following 1. Because they that were no Lawyers must Swear not only that they think it is unlawful but that it is so indeed 2. Because they think that this setteth a Commission above an Act of Parliament And that if one by a Law be made General or Admiral during Life another by a Commission may cast him out And though the Law say He shall be guilty of Treason if he give up his Trust to any upon pretence of a Commission Yet by this Oath he is a Traytor if he resist any one that hath a Commission 3. Because they fear they are to Swear to a contradiction viz. to set the King 's bare Commission above a Law which is the Act of King and Parliament and yet not to endeavour the Alteration of Government which they fear least they endeavour by taking this Oath 4. Because they think that by this means the Subject shall never come to any certain Knowledge of the Rule of his Duty and consequently of his Duty it self For it is not possible for us to know 1. What is to be called a Commission and what not and whether an illegal Commission be no Commission as the Lawyers some of them tell us and what Commission is illegal and what not and whether it must have the broad Seal on only the little Seal or none 2. Nor can we know when a Commission is counterfeit The King's Commanders in the Wars never shewed their Commissions to them that they fought against at least ordinarily There was a Collonel of the King 's since his coming in that brought a Commission Sealed with the broad Seal to seize on all the Goods of a Gentleman in Bishopsgate-street in 〈◊〉 by which he carried them away But the Commission being proved counterfeit he was hanged for it But a Man that thus Seizeth on any Gentleman's Money on Goods may be gone before they can try his Commission if they may not resist him But the Parliament and Courts of Justice are the Legal publick Notifiers of the King's mind and by them the Subjects can have a regular certain notice of it So that if the Parliament were concluded to have no part in the Legislative Power but the King 's meer will to be our Law yet if the Parliament and Courts of Justice be erected as the publick Declarers of his will to the People they seem more regardable and credible than the words of a private unknown Man that saith he hath a Commission 5. And they think that this is to betray is to the King and give the Chancellour or Lord-Keeper power at his pleasure to depose him from his Crown and dispossess him of his Kingdoms For if the King by Law or Commission shall settle any Trusty Subject in the Government of Navy or Militia or Forts and command them to resist all that would disposseâ—â— them yet if the Lord Chancellor have a design to depose the King and shall Sealâ—â— Commission to any of his own Creatures or Confidents to take possession of the said Forts Garisons Militia and Navy none upon pain of Death must resist them but â—e taken for Traytors if they will not be Traytors yea though it were but whilst they send to the King to know his Will And when Traytors have once got possession of all the Strengths the detecting of their stand will be too late and to Sue them at Law will be in vain And he that remembreth That our Lord Chancellor is now banished who lately was the chief Minister of State will think that this is no needless fear 6. And they think that it is quite against the Law of God in Nature which obligeth â—s to quench a Fire or save the Life of one that is assaulted much more of our selves against one that would kill him and that else we shall be guilty of Murder And according to the preper Sense of this Oath If two Foot-boys get from the Lord Chancellor a Commission to kill all the Lords and Commons in Parliament or to set the City and all the Country on Fire no Man may be Force of Arms resist them Lords and Commons may not save their Lives by force not the City their Houses And by this way no Man shall dwell or travel in safety while any Enemy or Thief may take away his Life or Purse or Goods by a pretended Commission and if we defend our selves but while we send to try them we are Traytors and few have the means of such a Tryall 7. They think by this means no Sheriff may by the Posse Comitatus execute the Decrees of any Court of Justice if 〈◊〉 can but get a Commission for the contrary 8. They think that Taxes and Subsidies may be raised thus without Parliaments and that all Men's Estates and Lives are at the meer will of the King or the Lord Chancellor For if any be Commissioned to take them away we have no remedy For to say that we have our Actions against them in the Courts of Justice is but to say that when all is taken away we may cast away more if we had it For what good will the Sentence of any Court do us if it pass on our side as long as a Commission against the Execution of that Sentence must not be resisted unless a piece of Paper be as good as an Estate 9. And they think that by this Oath we Swear to disobey the King if at any time he command us to endeavour any alteration of the Church-Government as once by this Commission to some of us he did about the Liturgy 10. And they think that it is a serving the Ambition of the Prelates and an altering of the Government to Swear never to endeavour any alteration of Church-Government yea and to put the Church-Government before the State-Government and so to make the Prelacy as unalterable as Monarchy and to twist it by an Oath into the unalterable Constitution of the Government of the Land and so to disable the King and Parliament from ever endeavouring any alteration of it For if the Subjects may not at any time nor by any means endeavour the King will have none to execute his Will if he endeavour it And if Divines who should be the most tender avoiders of Perjury and all Sin shall lead the way in taking such an Oath who can expect that any others after them should scruple it And it was endeavoured to have been put upon the Parliament 11. And they think that there is a great deal in the English Diocesian Frame of Church-Government which is very sinful and which God will have all Men in their places and callings to endeavour to reform