Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	aaron_n	altar_n	use_v	15	3	4.7543	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A58041	Mercurius Rusticus, or, The countries complaint of the barbarous outrages committed by the sectaries of this late flourishing kingdom together with a brief chronology of the battels, sieges, conflicts, and other most remarkable passages, from the beginning of this unnatural war, to the 25th of March, 1646.	Ryves, Bruno, 1596-1677.; Barwick, John, 1612-1664. Querela Cantabrigiensis.; Wharton, George, Sir, 1617-1681. Mercurius Belgicus.	1685 (1685)	Wing R2449; ESTC R35156	215,463	414

the Church might be answerable to the beauty of the Structure itself Bishop of Grandesson bestowed upon it vessels of God and vessels of Silver Books and all other kinds of rich furniture Copiâ Immensâ Immensi pretij in exceeding great measure of exceeding great price All which with many other things of necessary use and publick Ornament became a prey to the Schismatical Rebels whose sin was so much the greater because being neither inraged by Opposition nor made insolent by conquest Apologies that may possibly be taken up for other Rebels in other places as Chichester and Winchester but which was a main aggravation of their crime Citizens within their own Wall in coole Blood not provoked spoil and lay wast their Mother Church for after this City now most unworthy of those Priviledges and honorary rewards once purchased by their Loyalty now forfeited by ingratitude and Rebellion had once shut up their Gates against their King it was not long before they shut up the Gates likewise of Gods house denying all access to devout Persons there to make their Prayers and Supplications so near bordering upon Rebellion against the King is Atheism and Contempt of God for having demanded the Keys of the Cathedral and taken them into their own Custody they presently interdict divine service to be celebrated so that for the space of three quarters of a year the Holy Liturgy lay totally silenced Nor was the restraint upon the Reading Desk only the Pulpit was made Inaccessible to all Orthodox Loyal Ministers and was open only to Factious Schismatical Preachers whose Doctrin was Rebellion and their Exhortation Treason that so the People might hear nothing but what might soment their disloyalty and confirm them in their unnatural revolt from their duty and Obedience Having the Church in their possession in a most Puritanical beastly manner they make it a common Jakes for the Exonerations of Nature sparing no place neither the Altar nor the Pulpit though this last finds a better place in their estimation than the former yet prophaned it was nay so prophaned that it remains a doubt yet undetermined which prophaned it most in their Kinds either the Common-Soldiers or their Lecturers Over the Communion Table in fair letters of Cold was written the Holy and blessed name of Jesus this they expunge as Superstitious and Execrable On each side of the Commandmants the Pictures of Moses and Aaron were drawn in full proportion these they deface they tear the Books of Common-Prayers to pieces and as if this had been too small a contempt and despite done to that form of Gods holy worship they use them as if they had been a second sacrifice of Curious Arts and burn them at the Altar with exceeding great Exultation and expressions of joy They made the Church their Storehouse where they kept their Ammunition and powder and planted a Court of Guard to attend it who used the Church with the same reverence that they would an Ale-house and defiled it with tipling and taking Tobacco they brake and deface all the Glass windows of the Church which cannot be repaired for many hundred pounds and left all those ancient Monuments being painted glass and containing matter of story only a miserable spectacle of Commiseration to all well-affected hearts that behold them They strook off the heads of all the Statues on all Monuments in the Church especially they deface the Bishops Tombs leaving one without a Head another without a Nose one without a Hand and another without an Arm. A sad Emblem of that Trunk of Episcopacy which the accursed Atheists of these times have fancied to themselves and endeavoured a poor deformed mangled mutilated thing having neither head of Prelation nor face of Honour nor arm nor hand nor finger of power and jurisdiction they pluck down and deface the Statue of an Ancient Queen the Wife of Edward the Confessor the first Founder of this Church mistaking it for the Statue of the blessed Virgin Mary the Mother of God So she was stiled by the holy Catholick Church many years before it was in danger to be voted Blasphemy in that Committee where learned Miles Corbet sate in the Chair They brake down the Organs and taking two or three hundred Pipes with them in a most scornful contemptuous manner went up and down the street Piping with them and meeting with some of the Choristers of the Church whose surplesses they had stoln before and imployed them to base servile Offices scoffingly told them Boys we have spoild your trade you must go and sing hot Pudding Pyes By the absoluteness of their power they send forth their warrants to take away the Lead off a Conduit and a great Cistern that stood in the middest of the Close giving plentiful supplies of water to many hundreds of Inhabitants and by vertue of the same warrant they give their agents power to take a great quantity of Timber which was laid up and designed for the repairing of the Church such Timber as that it will be a very hard matter to procure the like all Timber not being fit for that use and with these a great stock of Lead out of the Common Store-house reserved there for the same purpose which warrants were accordingly put in execution to the full They did enter into a Consultation about taking down the Bells and all the Lead that covered the Church to convert them into Warlike Ammunition the Bells might be cast into Cannon the Lead into Bullets both would serve towards the effecting their Traiterous designs They took down the Gates of the Close which the Dean and Chapter had set up and kept locked every night for their security which Gates they imployed to help forward and strengthen their Fortifications They lay intolerabe taxes on most of the Members of the Church and whosoever refused to submit to those most unjust Illegal Impositions were threatned to have their Houses Plundered and their Persons sent on shipboard where they must expect usage as bad as at Argier or the Gallies Doctor Burnell a grave learned man and Canon of that Church refusing to submit to their Taxations they gave Command though he were at that time sick and confined not only to his Chamber but to his bed to take him in the night and bring him away to Prison though they brought him in his bed but upon much importunity some of the best rank of the Citizens being tendered his security to render himself a true Prisoner for that time they left him For the like refusal they took Doctor Hutchenson another Canon of the Church a man of a weak infirm Body but of a vigorous knowing Soul and violently carried him towards the Ship there to imprison him by the way as they carried him along he was not only by the permission but by the incouragement of those that led him Captive blasted and abused and howted at by the Boys and exposed to the affronts and revilings of the base Insolent Multitude at

growing Hemp and there lay on the Ground almost 20 Hours without Meat or any sustenance so that what with fright and dampness of the Earth some of them contracted dangerous Sicknesses and hardly escaped with Life The Terrour which fell upon the Country thereabout was so great that the neighbouring Justice of Peace durst not grant his Warrant to search after any of Sir Richard's Goods though earnestly intreated to it And the Neighbours were so ill used and threatned to extort confession from them where Sir Richard was or where any of his Goods were conveyed that some swooned for fear some fell mad and some died Certain it is their carriage was so barbarous that it inforced Mr. Jo. Crew one of the Company to profess his dislike and to tell the Lord Brooks and the rest That they being Law-makers should not be Law-breakers nor make such precedents as would discover their intentions and render them odious unto the Country Since that knowing Sir Richard to have put himself for preservation of his Life under his Majesties Protection they have caused his Pond-heads to be digged down and have destroyed all his Fish they have cut down his Woods and seised on all his Lands or made them utterly unprofitable unto him for they will not suffer any Bayliff or Servant of his to take any care of his Estate but have often sent parties of Horse to seise on them or kill them At a place called Kings-harbour near Hounslow-heath three Soldiers under the Command of the Lord Wharton came into a House to drink going away they of the House demand Money for their Drink So unexpected an affront did so incense the Soldiers that one of them told his Companions he would shew them how they set Houses on fire in Ireland and so put his Carbine into the Thatch and discharged it set the House on fire and departed The General ESSEX returning from London came by as the House was on fire complaint is made unto him that the owner of the House was undone but all in vain his Excellency was not at leisure to do Justice The Countess of Rivers who as you heard in the second Weeks Relation was Plundered to the value of an Hundred thousand or an Hundred and fifty thousand pounds finding her abode here unsafe having lost her Goods and her Person in danger to secure her self resolved for a time to abandon her Country and rather expose her self to the hazard of Travel than commit her self to that protection which the contemned Laws now afford To this purpose she obtained a Pass to go beyond Seas While she was in preparing for her Voyage Mr. Martin Plunder-master General he that so familiarly speaks Treason and steals the King's Horses or doth any thing plunders the Countess of her Coach Horses notwithstanding a Warrant from the Lords House to secure them And when this Warrant was produced to stave off this Parliament Horse-taker he replied That if the Warrant had been from both Houses he would obey it as coming from the highest authority in England sure this man was born with Treason in his Mouth but since it came But from the Lords he did not value it When this Warrant could not prevail the Countess obtains a Warrant from the Earl of Essex to have the Horses restored unto her again but Mr. Martin to overbear all procures an Order from the House of Commons to keep them This Honourable Ladies Goods were seised on though Licensed to pass by the Lords and searched and allowed by the Custome-House At Pebmarsh in the same County of Essex on the Lords Day divers of the Parliament Voluntiers came into the Church while the Parson Mr. Wiborow was in his Prayer before Sermon and placed themselves near the Pulpit and when he was in his Prayer one of them struck divers times with his Staff against the Pulpit to interrupt him and while he was in his Sermon in contempt of the place where they were and the sacred action in doing they were almost as loud as the Preacher to the great disturbance of the Congregation No sooner was the Sermon ended and the Parson come out of the Pulpit as far as the Reading-desk but they lay violent hands upon him rent his Clothes threaten to pull him in pieces in the Church With much intreaty they spare him there and permit him to go into the Church-yard he is no sooner come thither but they assault him more violently than before Mr. Wiborow seeing the Constable who all this while stood a spectator of his hard usage calls unto him and charges him in the King's Name to keep the Kings Peace At his request they did a little forbear him But before he could get half ways Home they assault him again and demand the Book of Common-Prayer which he used in the Church That which was found by the Parish being torn in pieces before which he refusing to deliver up unto them they reek their fury on him They tug and hale him and vow to kill him unless he deliver up the Book of Common-Prayer to their pleasure he stoutly refuseth Hereupon they fall upon him strike up his Heels and take it from him by force and so carry it away in triumph Mr. Blakerby a silenced Minister heretofore preaching at Halstead in the same County told them That to bow at the Name of Jesus was to thrust a Spear into Christ's side and such Ministers as signed Children with the sign of the Cross did as much as in them lay to send such Children unto the Devil When the Earl of Essex and the rest went from Reading to London after the unhappy to say no more surrender of that town they left there a Committee consisting of none but City Captains and Tradesmen these according to the authority committed unto them summon all the able men of the Parishes thereabout to appear before them at Reading and Assessed them at their pleasure In Marlow they Assessed one Mr. Drue at 1000 l. they fell to 500 l. he refusing to pay was Imprisoned but the Prison being most nasty and loathsom denied the accommodation of Bedding was forced to pay 300 l. Mr. Horcepoole they assessed at 200 l. Mr. Chase a man plundered before at 40 l. 20 pound was offered but nothing will be abated of 30. Eliot a Butcher at an 100 l. and Imprisoned Cocke a Baker at 20 l. Mr. Fornace the Vicar not suffered to speak for himself because a Malignant at 10 l. and paid seven John Langley 10 l. Thomas Langley 20 l. William Langley 5 l. and Wilmot his Servant 5 l. John More 80 l. Hoskins a Shoomaker 5 l. Cane an Innkeeper 7 l. Rates so Illegal or had they been Legal so unequally proportioned to these mens Estates that had Ship-money been still on foot it would not have drawn so much Money out of their Purses in forty or fifty years as this Blew-Apron Committee at Reading removed some seven or eight Degrees from the Close Committee at Westminster

to leave off his Pottage and to follow him Mr. Losse intreating him in that sacred work but to have patience until he had finished what he had began Patience me no patience replied the Groom my business is of greater importance than to admit of any delay come away therefore or I will pull you out by the ears thereupon not knowing whose Soldiers they were nor of what consequence their business might be or if he had known both yet not able to make resistance he obeys his command and followed him into the Church-yard Being come thither Mr. Losse demands what he would have with him the Groom tells him that he must go along with them to Northampton Mr. Losse demands again by what authority and by vertue of what Commission The Groom replies that he should know that when he came to Northampton Mr. Losse entreats that he may be excused alledging that he had lost Twelve or Thirteen Horses taken from him by the Parliament Soldiers and that he had never a Horse able to carry him two miles out of the Town one of the Troopers swears Wounds and Blood that he would carry him behind him and if that did not like him he would drag him along with a halter at his horse tail Mr. Losse abominating so great insolency from Grooms boldly told them That he would never be a Slave to slaves and so rushing from them took Sanctuary in the Church and shut the door upon him and perceiving the door on the other side of the Church open the People having unbarred it for their speedier passage out he hastens thither and tho he made what speed he could he was like to be prevented by one of the Troopers who was come about and was ready to enter the Church on horseback which Mr. Losse observing took up the bar of the door and resolutely ran at the Trooper to unhorse him This unexpected resistance so valiantly made put the Trooper to a retreat whereby Mr. Losse gained time to bar the door fast against him Having shut both the Church doors upon himself and the remainder of the Congregation some being fled for fear the Clerk at a hole gave him the Key of the Belfrey Mr. Losse not thinking himself secure enough in the Church gets up into the Belfrey and locks the doors fast after him being come to the place where the Bells hang he discovers over head a little hole only big enough for a man to creep through and a ladder standing there which led up unto it Mr. Losse goes up the ladder and through the hole gets upon the Leads and with great difficulty draws the Ladder after him being massy and very heavy by which means he did not only deprive his pursuers of the means to come at him but with the Ladder laid over the hole baracadoed the passage against them and now being here had he had any weapon to defend himself he had been impregnable While Mr. Losse was up in the Belfrey securing of himself the Troopers are at the Church windows endeavouring to wrench out the Iron bars but without any success at last with their Pole-axes and great Tombstones impiously taken from the Graves of the dead they break open the Church doors having thus forced their entrance they ride into the Church not remembring they were in Gods House from one end of it to another spurring and switching their Horses purposely to endanger the People These barbarous outrages did much affright the People but especially Mrs. Losse and her poor Children whom it most concerned Mr. Losse being the only man aimed at Mrs. Losse fell into a swoon in the Church and had no shew of life in her for a long time at which the People moved with compassion interceded with the Troopers and desired them to desist putting them in mind of the place where they were a place where God met with his People and they with their God It seems this Congregation had been better taught than to subscribe to Doctor Twist the Proloquutor of the absurd Heterogenious Synod his Interpretation of that Text of Scripture Ye shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my Sanctuary in his Preface to Mr. Meads Book of the Apostacy of the latter times as if this Text enjoyned no reverence to be used towards the places of Gods publick worship they were much scandalized at this prophane Irreverence and made it an argument to awe them to civil demeanour at least because of the place and withal they objected that they did much abuse themselves and dishonour their cause by such outragious carriages all this would reflect on the cause they pretended to maintain And lastly they alledged that if they had any shame in them they might be ashamed in the Lords House on the Lords day to abuse a Minister in his own Congregation who besides the honour and reverence due to his calling might challenge some respect from them being a Gentleman of good Birth and Descent In reply to so good reason being indeed but Pearl cast before Swine one breaks out with a great oath swearing Wounds and Blood so that all the Blasphemy is not on the Cavaliers side and saying What do you tell me of Birth and Descent a Plague take him and his Gentility I hope within this year to see never a Gentleman in England you remember the Proverb Children and Fools tell truth having thus despised all wholsome admonition they go to the Belfrey they break open the door and come to the place where the Bells did hang and from the top of the Frames of the Bells endeavoured through the hole but now mentioned to get upon the Leads where Mr. Losse was but he having stopped that passage with the Ladder and making the best use he could of his hands and feet being all the weapons either offensive or defensive which he had made good the place against them yet notwithstanding in the Resistence he was in very great danger to lose his life for they discharged their Pistols at him at least eight or nine times but by the good providence of God they missed their mark with their Swords they wounded him in three several parts of his body yet God be blessed the wounds were not mortal at last having received a hurt in his hand having a vein pricked with one of their Swords his blood flowed so fast upon the Troopers underneath him that as they bragged there and in other places after they were gone thence they thought they had dispatched him and therefore thinking him to be a dead man they left him yet to imbalm him to his funeral they pour out a flood of reproachful names upon him calling him Rogue Rascal Slave Villain Dog Devil making no stop till their Master the Devil and their own memories could suggest no more names of the same stamp At last to seal up all for fear they had not murthered him they protest with many Execrations upon themselves that if they had not now sped him which yet