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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42357	Protesters no subverters, and presbyterie no papacie; or, A vindication of the protesting brethren, and of the government of the kirk of Scotland from the aspersions unjustly cast upon them, in a late pamphlet of some of the resolution-party, entituled, A declaration, &c. With a discovery of the insufficiency, inequality and iniquity of the things propounded in that pamphlet, as overtures of union and peace. Especially, of the iniquity of that absolute and unlimited submission to the sentences of church-judicatories that is holden forth therein, and most unjustly pleaded to belong to the being and essence of presbyterial government. By some witnesses to the way of the protestation.	Guthrie, James, 1612?-1661, attributed name.	1658 (1658)	Wing G2264; ESTC R221886	66,607	126

because one Assembly will have it so But say our Brethren how shall Unity and Order otherwayes be preserved in the Church of God We Answer Very well because if the Sentence be unjust it ought to be recognized and repealed If it be just and of an inferiour nature If the persons will not submit they are after due procedure to be cast out as those that will not hear the Church and so both Unity and Purity both Order and Truth are preserved Will our Brethren under a pretext of Order destroy Christian-liberty and bring-in Popish-tyranny It is Christ's Order and the King of Saints Peace that every Believer have the judgment of discretion whether the Judicatories of the Kirk speak according to the Scriptures or whether they ought to obey or submit or gainsay or counteract and what Christ hath given them no man can take from them Their third Argument is taken from the judgement and practice of this and other Churches which as they affirm plead for this subordination and submission required by them in their Answer to the Queries of the 16. of November 1655. they say That this submission hath been established by the General Assemblies especially by the Assembly in Anno 1648. sess. 30. and practised by the General Assembly 1646. in the case of Mr. James Morison and the Presbyterie of Kirkwall And that it hath been the constant practice of all the Iudicatories and members of this Kirk ever since the late Reformation untill our present differences did arise And in their Paper of the 24. of Novemb. 1655. they do cite for proving of this submission the Act of the General Assembly 1647. concerning the hundred and eleven Propositions and the seventh head of doctrin●… therein contained And in the 39. page and 43. section of their Representation they are so confident as to tell the Brethren for the Protestation that their practice in matters of Discipline and Government was never heard of in this Church nor we believe say they in any Church where th●… Officers and constitution thereof were acknowledged to be agreeable to the Word of God but what-ever the superiour Iudicatories might do as they would be answerable notwithstanding an appeal yet the appealer and inferiour did alwayes submit and sist their proceedings till their cause wa●… heard and tried And to confirm all this in the fifth page of their Declaration they tell us that both themselves and the pr●…testing Brethren were solemnly engaged to this submission at their admission to the Ministery As to the judgment of our Church and of her General Assemblies we do deny that ever they were of this judgment or have declared any such thing but upon the contrary let the Confession of Faith presented unto the Parliament and ratified by them in the year 1567. bear witnesse Artic. 21. concerning the power and authority of Councils lawfully gathered the words are these So far as the Council proveth the Determination and Commandment that it giveth by the plain Word of God so soo●… do we reverence and imbrace the same But if men under the name of a Council pretend to forge unto us new Articles of our Faith or to make constitutions repugn●…ng to the Word of God then utterly we must refuse the same as the doctrine of devils which draweth our souls from the voice of our only God to follow the doctrines and constitutions of men In the beginning of the Reformation 1562. It is concluded by the whole Ministery in the Assembly held that year sess. 2. That Ministers shall be subject in all lawfull admonitions as is prescribed in the Book of Discipline Likewise it is provided in the Articles agreed upon by the Gen. Assembly held at Edinburgh in March 1570. sess. 2. concerning the Jurisdiction of the Kirk That the suspension and deprivation of Ministers and others admitted to functions in the Kirk charge of souls c. shall be for lawfull causes In the Book of Discipline agreed upon in divers preceding General Assemblies and recorded in the year 1581. by order of the Assembly held in April sess. 9. to the defence of which Discipline the King and Subjects of all ranks did then subscribe and swear which was also renewed in the year 1638. It is expresly declared chap. 7. concerning Elderships Assemblies and Discipline That Office-bearers are to be deposed for good and just causes deserving deprivation If it were needfull we could cite more of this kind We shall only adde other two testimonies from very late Assemblies of this Kirk The Assembly conveened at S. Andrews in Anno 1642. ●…ess 8. in the Overture for transplantation of Ministers do declare That no Presbyterie or Assembly should passe a sentence for transportation of any Minister till they give reasons for the expediency of the same both t●… him and his Congregation and to the Presbyterie whereof he is a member That if they acquiesce to the reasons given it is so much the better if they do not acquiesce yet the Presbyterie or Assemblie by giving such reasons before the passing of their sentence shall make it manifest that what they do is not pro arbitratu vel imperio only but upon grounds of reason And the Assembly conveened at Edinburgh in Anno 1647. in their brotherly exhortation to their Brethren of England do declare as followeth We would not say they have our zeal for Presbyteriall Government misunderstood as if it tended to any rigour or domineering over the flock or to hinder and exclude that instructing in meeknesse them that oppose themselves which the apostolicall rule holdeth forth or as if we would have any such to be entrusted with that Government as are found not yet purged either from their old profanenesse or from the prelatical principles and practices which were to put a piece of new cloath into an old garment so to make the rent worse or to put new wine into old bottles so to lose both wine and bottles From these passages impartially considered it is manifest that the General Assemblies have judged that as it is rigor and a domineering over the Lord's flock for the Judicatories of the Kirk to determine or do any thing pro arbitratu vel ●…mperio or without giving a reason thereof from the Word so when they do thus determine and judge there is no reason to submit thereunto or acquiesce therein As to what is cited by our Brethren from the Act of the General Assembly in Anno 1648. sess. 30. We answer That though the word justly be not expressed in the letter of the Act that being amongst the praecognita or praesupposita of all those that do make or require obedience to Laws that they make and mean of just Laws yet it is evident that it speaketh of those Ministers who being justly suspended or deposed from the function of the Ministery shall continue in the exercise of their Ministery or intromet with the stipends belonging to those Kirks they served at as doth

no reason of ●…quity in them but their own meer arbitrament and pleasure or though there be iniquity and injustice in them Dan. 11. 36. and when subjection without gainsaying is not only required of private and particular men but also o●… all inferiour Judicatories and even of these that are clothed with lawfull power and authority Was not this the State-tyranny that was formerly exercised and 〈◊〉 for by the Malignant-party to which there was publick opposition made by defensive Armes that are generally acknowledged by all sober men both Polititians and Divines to be a lawfull mean of a peoples preservation from the mine that is threatened by Tyranny And shall we now set up a Church-tyranny the meer will and abitrement yea the unjust Sentences of Church-judicatories for Laws and require absolute submission thereunto not only of private and single persons but of all in●…iour Judicatories not allowing the Congr●…gational-eldership once to whisper against what is resolved by the Presbyterie or the Presbyterie against what is resolved by the Synod or the Synod against what is resolved by the General Assembly If then the superiour Judicatories will tyrannize what remedy is there or if they become corrupt how shall the ruine of Religion or the persecution and oppression of these who desire to keep Faith and a good Conscience be avoided Have the Ministers and Saints and Courts of Jesus Christ received Religion and His Ordinances upon these tearms that if a superiour Court will have it so they shall all crouch down as Asses under the burden and let them without gainsaying they being now cudgel'd into silence by a sentence of suspension from the Sacrament or Deposition or Excommunication ruin Church and Ministers and Ordinances and Professors and all the precious interests of Jesus Christ And shall we say that such a submission is required in this case as though they ought to do nothing but weep and pray in secret How great tyranny is this and how remedilesse a way to ruin And yet this is the consequent of our Brethren's opinion If they tell us that there is no hazard of these things because the Church of Scotland is sound in Doctrine and Worship and Discipline and Government and that it is upon the account of the soundnesse of the Church-judicatories only that they challenge this submission as due unto them We desire 1. to know whether they will grant that such a submission as they do now plead for may be denied to Church-judicatories that are unsound and what degrees of unsoundnesse they will have them to fall into before this submission can be warrantably denied unto them It seems to us by our Brethrens judgement as long as they keep any thing of the being and authority of Kirk-judicatories though they be corrupt not only in the particular Determinations to which submission is required but in many things besides both in Doctrine and Discipline and Government this submission must be granted them because to deny it is to deny the very being and essence of the Government How this shall be avoided we do not see unlesse they say That a Church-judicatory that is unsound in any point of Truth doth lose its being and authority which we hope they will not say having in some of their Papers charged it as heterodoxie upon the Protesting Brethren 2. As we shall be glad that they will confine this submission to sound Judicatories upon the accompt of their soundnesse only so in the case of their so doing we do not see what this importeth more in the matter of submission than the Protesting Brethren are willing to yeeld to wit A submission to all sound Determinations and just Sentences of the respective Judicatories of the Kirk without any counteracting because if it be given to them upon that accompt only that they are sound then is it only to be given to them when they are sound and right in their resolutions and actings which the Protesting Brethren willingly yeeld and be like in some particular cases somewhat more We finde them in their last Paper in the Conference at Edinburgh November 25. 1655. professing that if the case were only of particular persons in things of more private interest and personal concernment and of Judicatories imploying their power to edi●…ication in the current of their actings they would not much contend about it But 3. the Protesting Brethren do deny tha●… the Church of Scotland is now sound It is their sad complaint that there is in the Church the plu●…ality of her Judica●…ories very much practical●… unsoundnesse not only because of their not improving the precious Ordinances of God for bearing down of the kingdom of sin and Satan and advancing the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ but also because of their abusing of them in many things for a carrying on of a course of defection from former integrity and purity and a course of persecution against godly Ministers and Elders and Professors in the Land who cannot be consenting to their backsliding courses therefore do these Brethren conceive that they have the more reason to refuse to engage themselves to an absolute submission to the Sentences of the Church Judicatories whilst the power is in such hands because it were to betray themselves and the Work and People of God to the lusts and will of men We conclude this debate of the nature of that submission that is due to Church-Judicatories with two testimonies of men who are deservedly acknowledged to be great and worthy asserters of Presbyteriall Government The first is of the Authors of the Divine-right of Church-Government who in the 15. Chap. of that book treating of the subordination of particular Churches to greater Assemblies for their authoritative judging and determining of causes Ecclesiasticall and the Divine right thereof do write thus It is granted say they that the highest Ecclesiasticall Assembly in the world cannot require from the lowest a subordination absolute and pro arbitrio i. e. at their own meer will and pleasure but only in some respect subordination absolute being only to the Law of God laid down in the Scripture We detest Popish tyrannie which claimeth a power of giving their will for a Law It is subjection in the Lord that is pleaded-for the streightest rule in the world unlesse the holy Scricpture we affirm to be regulam regulatam i. e. a rule to be regulated peace being only in walking according to Scripture Canon Gal. 6. ver. 16. The other is of our Country-man Mr. George Gillespie in his Assertion of the Government of the Church of Scotland the sec. part ch. 2. page 127. We must distinguish saith he betwixt a dependance absolute and in some respect a Congregation doth absolutely depend upon the holy Scriptures alone as the perfect rule of Faith and manners of Worship and of Church-Government for we accurse the tyrannie of Prelates who claimed to themselves autocratorick power over Congregations to whom they gave their Naked-will for a Law one of