and as the House of Commons sends to the House of Lords and the House of Lords to the House of Commons by their Messengers and as all businesses are to be done in the Name of the States and in the name of either Lords or Commons so those little sucking congregations and churches though they consist but of 10. or twenty a peece although never an one of them knowes any more what belongs to government then the horse Master Knollys preaches on when he goeth into the Countrey yet they send their Officers in the name of the Church to any other of their Churches upon any difference or about any of their Grolleyes with as great State and Grander as if they were very absolute principalities and they use by the report of those that have seene the manner of their carriage in their imployment in imitation of greatnesse the same garbe and gestures that Embassadours or those that carry a Message from the House of Commons to the House of Lords usually do making their honours and conges and they are such bunglers at the work as those that have seene them say it is one of the ridiculosest spectacles that ever was beheld for they make a thousand Jackinaps tricks and act their severall parts with such affectation of State that experienced men and such as well know what belonges to the entertainment of Embassadors affirme that they never beheld any thing so fanaticall It is reported that Iohn Lilburne my Scholler is Master of the Ceremonies amongst them and teaches them their postures of Court-ship If ever there were any people in the world that trampled all government both Divine and Humaine under their poluted feete or ever made a scorne of authority I may truly say the Independents are the â—en and yet they applaud themselves in all their actions and sticke not to say by these their doings they set up the Lord Christ upon his throne in his Kingdome and in their houses and compt all those that differ from them of their congregationall way as enemies of the Lord Iesus and of his kingdome and esteeme of them as of a company of Infidels and yet they have neither precept nor president for their so doing but St. Diotrephes in all the holy Word of God which constituted a Presbytery in every Church and committed the government of all the congregations under each Presbytery into the hands of a Common-councel and Colledge of Elders as that Church Saint Iohn write unto can witnesse which was governed by the conjoynt consent of them all in which Saint Iohn was a Presbyter and therefore writ If he came he would remember Diotrephes deeds which abundantly declareth that Saint Iohn acknowledged a Court a settled government in every church whether the members might have recourse for redresse of any abuse or scandalls and therefore took no more upon him then belonged unto his place and this shall suffice to have answer'd to Master Knollys his last whibbling cavill and to have spake of this point of controversie between us in this place I shall answer methodically to all his other evasions in their due places which the reader shall finde as they are scattered through the booke for he is very immethodicall in all his pamphlet where I will set downe Master Knollys his owne words But in the meane time it is sufficiently confirmed out of the Word God and out of all the Scriptures above quoted that all the churches we reade of in the New-Testament were so many corporations in Christs kingdome which were to be governed by a Common-councell of Presbyteries And so for many yeeres after the Apostles times they were Governed Communi consilio presbyterorum as our brethren the Independents do confesse and prove by antiquity and humane authority which weapon I wonder they will contend with in deciding of Gods matters which are only out of his holy Word to be proved which is to be the rule of our faith But it seemes Saint Ambrose his authority pleaseth them well though if we looke into it it makes much against them He lived as the author that cites him saith within the fourth Century His words are these upon the 1. of Timothy Synagoga postea ecclesia seniores habuit quorum sine consilio nihil agebatur in Ecclesia Quod qua negligentia obsoleverit nescio nisi doctorum desidia aut magis superbia dum soli volunt aliquid videri Take with it his own interpretation The Iewes Synagogue saith he and afterwards the Christian church had Elders without whose counsell nothing was done in the church which by what neglect it grew out of use I knew not unlesse it were perhaps the sloth or rather pride of the teachers whilest alone they would seeme to be some body However it is acknowledged by their owne testimony that in the Apostles time and many yeares after the Apostles nothing was done in the church without the Councell of the Presbyters So that it is evident the Primitive churches were governed by the joynt and common councell of the Presbytery and the people had nothing to do with it We may adde here unto Saint Ambrose Saint Ieromes testimony who in his Commentaries upon the first chapter of the Epistle of Paul to Titus largely declaring himselfe as in many other places concerning the occasion of the change of that government established by the Apostles saith Idem est ergo Presbyter qui Episcopus antequam diaboli instinoâ—u studia in religione fiâ—râ—nt diceretur in populis ego sum Pauli ego Apollo ego autem Cephe communt Presbyterorum consilio Ecclesiae gubernabantur c. In the which words he acknowledgeth by the first institution all Churches were governed by the common councell of the Presbyters and not by the advice of the people Yea the very Canons of the Pope in the first part and the 95. distinction giving the reason why the Presbyterian Government came to be changed and the Hierarchiall was put in the place affirmeth that it was through faction and for the avoyding of further Schismes and rents in the Church and cities using the very words before quoted out of Saint Ierome and confesseth that before that time the Churches were governed Commum consilio Presbyterorum not by the people or any one Prelate but by the Presbytery and their councell And if humaine authority were needfull in this businesse I might make a volume with their very expressions to prove the novelty of the Hierarchicall government and that of the peoples jurisdiction assuming the Authority of governing into their hands and the Antiquity of the Presbytery and that by the enemies own confession Bet I am resolved to cleave only unto the Word and sound reason deduced from thence for the deciding of this controversie being sorry that there was so much as occasion of naming humane authority in a point of Divinity As for the Presbyterian government in the sense that I understand it there is nothing more
20. vers the 7. And our Brethren do not deny this And it is well known that the Primitive Christians had their meetings and assemblies in private houses as by the many places is manifest which I cited but a little before Besides the Sacrament of breaking bread is no Temple-ordinance and therefore could not be adminisâ—â—ed in the Temple with the safety of the Christians and Believers for if they were so highly displeased with the Apostles for preaching Iesus and the Resurrection in the Temple as it appeareth Acts 4. 2. They would not have suffered them to have administred the Sacraments there And if Paul was so assaulted Acts 21. 28. for being but supposed to have brought Greeks into the Temple what would these men have done if one should have brought in a new Ordinance and a new worship and service and that so contrary to their legall rights Surely the Iewes would never have suffered it neither do the Brethren contend for this Now it is well known that in the Primitive Church if not every day yet every first day of the Week at least they met together to break bread that is to receive the holy Sacrament which was never without preaching as we see in Acts 20. 7. and in the places above quoted in which it is said they dayly brake bread together and that in severall and particular houses and that of necessity must be for a few houses could not have held so many thousands as all reason will dictate and if they were or could be contained under one roof yet they must be forced to be in diverse and severall chambers or roomes So that what is done and spoke in the one the other knowes nothing of it so that they are still severall congregations as under the roofe of Pauls there are diverse meeting places where Men may partake in all Ordinances and they are called severall Churches and they that meet there several congregations though under one roof for the distinction of the places under one covert makes alwayes a distinct assembly as it is dayly seen in the severall Committees at Westminster where every Committee of both Houses have their severall roomes and equall authority and are yet all but one Parliament though distributed into so many severall assemblyes So here they had severall assemblies and that in severall houses as is declared and reason it selfe without any testimony of holy Scripture will perswade this for the Apostles they all preached and that dayly and they must have severall roomes to preach in to avoyde confusion for all things in the Church must be done in order and they must have severall auditories or assemblies or else they should preach to the walls so that if the Apostles would all preach and the people all heare of necessity they must be distributed into severall congregations and assemblyes to avoyde disorder and that there were severall congregations and severall assemblies the places above specified do declare and tell us So that there is no man that resolves not to oppose all truth that is contrary to his received opinion but may evidently perceive that there were many congregations and assemblies in the Church of Ierusalem and yet they all made but one Church and were govern'd by one Presbytery as the many Committees in both Houses are in divers roomes and make divers assemblies and have equall power and authority among themselves and yet they all make but one Parliament and all those severall Committees are govern'd by the joynt consent of the Great Civill Presbytery of the Kingdome which is all the Parliament and all this without confusion yea with most excellent order and decency This is the last argument I produced out of the above cited Scriptures to prove that there were many assemblies of beleevers in the Church of Ierusalem before the persecution And concerning this argument Mr Knollys before he comes to answer it makes a little sucking preamble His words are these But the Doctor saith he hath one argument which is more to the purpose then all the other which I desire the reader seriously to consider page 64. Thus he His Answer to this Argument is as followeth I will set down all his own words which are these Now I desire the Reader to consider how the Doctor proves his Minor which he saith it manifest from Acts 2. 46. and chapter the 5. 12. 42. and chapter 3. 11. 12. and many more places that might be produoed page 64 65 66. In all which discourse the Doctor gives you nothing but his own suppositions and conclusions for the proofe of his Minor proposition which is his manner of discoursing through his booke This Argument saith he I answer First by denying the assumption or Minor proposition and the reason of my denying it is because the Scriptures produced by the Doctor do not in expresse words declare that there were divers assemblies and congregations of beleevers in the Church of Jerusalem The Scriptures quoted do in expresse words declare the contrary to what the Doctor would prove For Acts the 2. verse 42. 46. All that beleeved were together and they continued with one accord in the Temple And Acts the 3. 11 12. it is expresly said that all the people can together to them in the Porch which is called Solomons Acts the 5. 12. And they were all with one accord in Solomons Porch So that these Scriptures produced by the Doctor to prove that there were divers assemblyes and congregations of beleevers in the Church of Jerusalem who met together in severall places at one and the same time upon the first day of the weeke where they did partake in all Ordinances do expresly prove the contrary to wit that the Apostles and all the Beleevers in the Church of Jerusalem met together with one accord in one place to wit in the Temple and in Solomons Porch and brake bread from house to house 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 domatim not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 per singulas domos and thus they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quotidie day by day and they continued stedfast the Apostles doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers and all that beleeved â—â—re together Acts the 2. v. 42 44 46. Yea the Doctor himselfe saith in his Minor proposition the latter part of it That the Apostles and all the Beleevers in Jerusalem did continue dayly with one accord in the Temple and that they brake from house to house and this shall suffice for refutation of what the Doctor hath written touching the first proposition Thus profound Mr Knollys confutes my arguments I have set down all his words at large And as he earnestly desired the Reader seriously to consider my Argument So I in like manner intreat him that he would but looke back upon it and advisedly weight whether there be nothing either in that or any other of my arguments and in all my discourse but my own suppositions and conclusions for proofe of what
an evidence of sincerity David a man according to Gods ownâ— heart publisheth this as a manifestation of his integrity that hee hated Gods enemies appealing unto God saying Doe not I hate them O Lord that hate thee and am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee J hate them with perfect hatred I count them mine enemies Psal 139. 21 22. had not David thus hated Gods enemies hee could never have cleared his faithfulnesse to God And this is undeniable that those who David hated with perfect hatred were not nor could not be greater enemies to God then you have accused the Presbyterians to be for you proclame them enemies to the Sonne of God the Lord Jesus Christ whom God hath anoynted to be the King Priest and Prophet of his Church Isa 61. 1. Psal 45. 7. Psal 2. 6. Dan. 7. 14. Revel 17. 14. Psal 110. 4. Heb. 7. 27. Deut. 18. 18. Act. 3. 23. Now whosoever are enemies to Christs Kingly office and will not have him to raigne over them they are open enemies to God resisters of his will and opposers of his infinite wisedome for he hath given all power unto the Sonne Matth. 28. 18. and all such his enemies hee will command to be brought and slaine before him Luke 19. 27. O Brother either give glory to God and confesse you have highly offended in maintaining such an uncharitable opinion whereby you condemne all godly holy selfe-denying Christians that walke not in your way yea all the Reformed Churches in Europe or if you with other Independents will still persevere in charging the Presbyterians to be enemies to Christs Kingly office and if you absolutely beleeve they are such then acknowledge that those Independents hate the Presbyterians if not it may justly be suspected such Independents are not sincere to God nor the onely Saints because they doe not like holy David manifest their integrity for the Saints shew their sincerity in loving God with all their hearts with all their soules and with all their might which Love cannot be set forth more clearely then by their labouring so to walkâ— that their whole Lives and Conversations may bee squared according to Gods Royall will and the example of his holy Saints and servants And this is the will of God that all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father Hee that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him Ioh. 5. 23. but the Independents doe not honour the Son as the Saints of old have honoured the Father unlesse they account all the enemies of Jesus Christ their enemies and hate them with a perfect hatred Therefore upon due deliberation the whole universe will conclude this truth and give in their verdict that either you and other Independents are too rash and ridgid in censuring for it is notorious what you and they hold teach and write concerning the Presbyterians viz. that they are enemies to the Kingly office of Iesus Christ and make but a mocke King of him c. Or if the Presbyterians be indeed guiltie of the like enmitie against the Lord Christ as the wicked Jewes were who crucified him as you accuse them then the Independents doe hate the Presbyterians more then they doe or may their mortallest enemies because they pronounce these to be enemies to the Sonne of God his beloved Son in whom he is well pleased otherwise if the Independents know the Presbyterians to be so desperately wicked as you have said and doe not hate them then this verdict will bee given in that they are not the only Saints and godly party as they speake of themselves for the Saints hate all the knowne enemies of God and of his Sonne the Lord Iesus Christ So then that which I briefly gave but a touch of in my Post-script being thus evidently proved from your owne tenents both by Scripture and reason none who doe not make it their delight to cavill and their worke to except against every truth that is spoken can considering the grounds question the verity of what I there said I come now to answer your complaint and Queries made and laid downe in your booke pag. 27. where for the space of foure or five lines you breake off your discourse with mee and to insinuate into the Reader complaine of me saying Hee commends the Kings Cavaliers for brave Gentlemen and hee found more favour from them which he doth ever acknowledge for a singular courtesie then ever hee found from Protestant Goalers Thus having complained of my gratitude which in all other is accounted a commendable vertue you begin to parle with me againe and strictly inquire what was the cause that moved the Popish Cavaliers to shew mee favour and then you raise Questions viz. was it that you discovered unto them some of that bitternesse of spirit against the Independents or some courtly compliance with Papists preferring them before Independents or Protestants that made those Popish Cavaliers so much to applaud you Thus you Brother for your complaint and quaeries I entreat you be not offended that I say had you not been when you framed them so far transported with causlesse passion as it left no place for brotherlo love truth well grounded reason or your own experience to dictate unto you certainly you would never have thus complained nor propounded them therefore I shall repeat my own words and whosoever reads them will soon discern how unworthily you deal with me what a causlesse abusive complaint have you made and how little ground or colour you have for the propounding such quaeries I having there given a reason why the Popish Cavaliers shewed me favour sufficient to satisfie any that will not maliciously pretend they are unsatisfied For in the fourth page of my Defence I speaking of the clamorous tongues of Independents and how that after they understood I differed in opinion from them before they had seen my books they railed against me raised up false reports and calumniated me as the greatest Incendiary in the Kingdome in all which they most shamefully as dayly still they do abused me thereunto I replyed in these words I have been freed from that reproach by both Houses of Parliament who adjudged all my sufferings unjust as against the Law and Liberty of the Subject And if it were a thing that could be any way usefull unto me I could prove by many of the brave Gentlemen in the Kings Army who in great Assemblies did acknowledge when I was a Prisoner amongst them that I had great injury done me Yea the Papists themselves have often averred it that never any Subject suffered more unjustly then I did in that I was cast into Prison and fined for maintaining the Prerogative Royall of the King against the Pope and for defending that Religion which was established by the Laws of the Land And further added that had any Catholique writ as well in defence of their Religion as I did for the maintenance of the
know and their daily scriblings in print can witnesse the contrary whereupon to take away if it were possible all occasion of their calumnious tongues I writ unto Reverend and Learned Master Cranford intreating him that hee would for the stopping of all their mouths license his Booke which he willingly to pleasure me condescended unto giving his reason withall in writing under his owne hand why he made such a transgression the which Master Knollys concealed wherein he dealt not candidly for it gave great occasion to the Sectaries to traduce Master Cranford not a little And after this was printed came forth an other Pamphlet by one I. S. called Flagellum Flagolli or Doctor Bastwicks quarters beaten up which was the cause of the Title and Inscription of this Booke and I being not many weeks after at Westminster some asking me there why I had not yet replyed unto them I answered not in a triumphing manner as my brother Burton relateth but merrily yet in respectful terms that I understood my Brother Burtons Booke was comming forth against me and when once that appeared I would answer them altogether This is all as I remember was spake by me Now they having their Emissaries and Lisners in all corners it seemes some of them over-heard that which was spoken by me which they related to my Brother Burton in other language then I uttered it the which provoked him a fresh as he saith page 1. in arâ—nam descendere and to take both my bookes in hand and so una fidelia duos parietes and although he was disswaded from fowling his fingers with my Post-script as hee confesseth yet being as hee saith bound by a double ingagement the one for the cause the other for his person he hasted at length as fast as before hee was slow to give me an answer to them both and howsoever I had not so much as named him in either of my Bookes but onely sent him them he having desired it yet he being not capable of the good counsell that was given him by his friend fouled not only his fingers with me but the whole man soule and body picking a groundlesse quarrell with me telling me though I named him not that I had vellicated him and pluckt him by the very beard and as the Prelate of Canterbury said once that when I writ against the Pope I meant him so my Brother Burton imagined I meant him because in my Post-script pag. 44. I had these words that not onely the Novices Younkers and Fresh-water souldiers but grave men in their great white-basket-hilted Beards with their swords in their hands came out to fight against their brethren for their Independency c. which merry expression of mine though I spake in the number of multitude he applying unto himselfe affirmes that I meant him as if there had beene none amongst the Independent in white-basket-hilted beards but himselfe which moved him to great choler and indignation against mee and so inraged him that he sheweth nothing but passion through his whole Booke as will easily appeare to every one that readeth it in the which he tels mee that the Wise man saith Prov. 20. ver 29. 16. 31. the beauty of old men is their gray head yea a crown of Glory being found in the way of Righteousnesse which I shall ever assent unto but if a gray head be found in the way of error Schisme and Vnrighteousnesse then that place is not for his purpose Now I shall referre these two Questions or Queries to the judgement of all solid Christians First Whether or no my Brother Burton be found in the way of Righteousnesse Secondly Whether Independency be the way of Righteousnesse And to begin with the first in the second page of his Booke he promiseth me that I shall not find with him so much as a white staffe to lift up against me and yet in the seventh pag. he comes out against me with Phocions black Hatchet which is his Pole-axe with which he fals upon me soule and body cleaving both my head and heart sparing no part of me and in the same second page he promiseth me that he will answer me in the words of truth and sobernesse and in the spirit of meeknesse and love These are his words who would not thinke that should heare him speak but that he herad the sweet voice of Iacob yet if hee looke but into his Booke before he commeth halfe way to the conclusion he will soone see the rough hands of Esau and well perceive that he answers me in the words of error and passion and in the spirit of bitternesse insolency and hatred and that he hath learned that Lesson well Calumniare audacter aliquid haerebit calumniate boldly something will sticke which he hath done with as much acrimony as I thinke any man ever did against a Brother and quondam Fellow-sufferer all which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hard and harsh termes I can no lesse then spread before the Lord the Righteous judge ever remembring Regium est male audire cum bene feceris Now whether or no my Brother Burton in breaking thus his promise with me in all respects and dealing so unrighteously and injuriously with mee though he come out in his beautifull Gray Head be found in the way of Righteousnesse and be one of those men Solomon speaketh of I referre it to the judgement of the Learned But before I passe on to my second Querie I shall take liberty to make use of some of Reverend and Learned Master Calamies words for the more corroborating the judgement of the Reader concerning this first question He in his just and necessary Apology against my Brother Burtons unjuct invective concerning Truth shut out of doores page 2. hath this expression concerning my brother Burton His words saith he are swords and speares rather then words Hee fights with his heeles rather then with his head and kicks rather then argues and whips rather then answers Scarce any man since Montagues Appeal hath written with more bitterness I may say of him as Dr Rivet doth of Bishop Montague Non potest vir ille sine convitiis quenquam a quo dissentit vel in levissimis nominare Rivet Apol. this man cannot so much as mention any one from whom he differs in opinion though it be but in the slightest matters without reproach And as Plato said to Diogenes when hee trode upon the pride of Plato thou treadest upon my pride with a greater pride So saith Master Calamy doth Mr Burton tread upon me and whatsoever is blame-worthy in me with a pride more then episcopall and surely if to be railed upon and reviled be sufficient to bring a man into discredit then I must be esteemed as the dung off scouring and filth of the world c. Thus that learned man truly spake of my brother Burton whose faculty chiefly lies in abusing most men that differ from him though but in the least things But what Mr Calamy says of
For first as the Jesuites and Papists separate from all our Assemblies counting themselves the onely Catholicks and all our Congregations Hereticall and all us Heretiques Even so do the Sectaries deal with us they separate from our Churches as prophane societies esteeming themselves the onely Saints and their new Congregations the only Churches in which Christ is set up as King upon his Throne And as the Jesuites and Papists magnifie themselves and their Masters for the onely seraphicall Doctors and in all their writings boast of their eminent learning and slight and contemn all the Protestant writers as nothing so do the Independents and Sectaries highly magnifie themselves and esteem of all the Presbyterians as the off-scouring of the earth making them the sillyest creatures of the world in comparison of themselves as in all their Vindications and forthy Pamphle s dayly appeareth yea they write against them with more then an episcopall pride So that in all these their dealings they are lâ—ke the Jesuites and Papists Again as the Jesuites and Priests amongst the Papists make all the Protestant Ministers with the Presbyterian government odious and hatefull to the people even so do all the Independents and Sectaries incense the people against all our godly Ministers and Presbyters and the Presbyterian Government falsly perswading them that children killed Exod. 1. ver 16. 22. that he might weaken the people of God so the Independents and Sectaries labour to deale with us for if amongst the Presbyterians any masculine spirits come forth with Christian manly courage to discover the evill of their wayes having piety wisdome lâ—arning abilities gifts and parts wherewith they are able to oppose their errors these they indeavour to have supprest and to kill in their good names which is better then life and for the accomplishing of this they have their agents besides their scurrilous reviling pamphlets to ride from City to Country and to go from house to and to cast all the males that knowingly and conscienciously appear of a contrary judgement unto them into the deep rivers of Calumnies laying on their backs such loads of fals defamations as may for ever drown them in their credits and reputations in the torrents of this troublesome world and by this their Egyptian policy they suppose in a short time to weaken the Presbyterians making them by their reproaches unfit for any imployment in Church and State as if they were dead men by which means they bring in their own party and so think to increase and strengthen themselves but those their diabolicall practices with all their Agents God will in his due time fully discover and certainly destroy and down them all in the sea of his indignation they being all contrary unto his holy Word and royall Commands and therefore although they come to us in their gray heads yet they are not in the way of righteousnesse nor in the way of the old Puritans of ENGLAND And tâ—uly if we look into the whole proceedings of the Independents and Sectaries of our times we shall find them most agreeable to all the practices both of the Jesuites and Aegyptians and the Pharisees of old those cruell enemies of God and his people and dear servants for the Pharisees would ever oppose Christ and interrupt him in his Ministery and their weapons they deal with are all carnall as those I have now mentioned and that weapon my brother Burton cometh out against me with viz his Phocions hatchet which I cannot but speak something of before I conclude this my Epistle to the Reader In the seventh Page of his book he hath these words You bring saith he the Scripture for you Come on brother let you and me try it by the dint of this Sword And truly I shall by the helpe of my God make no long work of it You spend about eleven sheets wherein you have woven sundry long threaden arguments to measure out your Dependent Presbytery as holding paralell with the line of Scripture Now you mâ—nst pardon me saith he if I shall assay according to an old Proverb with one stroke of Phocions hatchet to cut in two the long thred of your Alcibiadian fluent and luxuriant Rhetorications Thus he Here my brother Burton seems to desire that he and I may try out the truth of what I have written by the dint of the sword of the Scripture and I say as David did in another sense 1 Sam. 21. 9. There is none like that but he immediately forsakes that weapon and betakes himselfe to Phocions hatchet and that is his Pole-ax Truly I exceedingly pity him who strives to maintain a way that brings him into such a straight that he cannot cut in two the arguments brought against him without a hatchet whereas the Sword of the holy Scripture is sharp enough to cut in two with one stroke any erroneous arguments For the Word of God is quick and powerfull and sharper then any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joynts and marrow and is a discoverer of the thoughts and intents of the heart Heb. 4. 12. But he knowing very well that with the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God Gal. 6. 17. though it be a two-edged sword c. that he could never cut in two with that weapon my arguments the truth and strength of them being drawn out of the Word of God upon which I have grounded all my assertions which is a sure unmoveable and impregnable foundation therefore laying aside the sword of the Scripture he vapours with an unknown hatchet a desperate carnall weapon and to please himself he assays to chop hack and mangle my arguments which he is never able to cut in two with all his strength and strokes Surely none but a bad cause and an unwarrantable way had need to make use of such a weapon Now for the Presbyterians as their way is warrantable being grounded on the holy Scripture the good Word of God the practice of the Apostles and all the Churches constituted by them so the weapons of their warfare are not carnall but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds 2 Cor. 10. 4. And for my part I am resolved never to use any other but that heavenly weapon the sharp sword of the spirit for the hewing and pulling down of all the strong holds of the Independents and Sectaries and for the dividing and cutting in two all their erroneous opinions and by the help of my God and through the power of his might and by his assisting grace I shall never doubt but by the dint of that sword ever be able to try it out with my brother Burton and all those of his fraternity and to oppose any adversaries of the truth and to make no long work of it and alwayes to be sufficiently armed to maintain it and all the wayes of God which I have formerly suffered for and still continue to hold forth and
himselfe his good Friend his Lord and Master the King of Saints and King of Kings the mighty Potentate the sole and only head and Lawgiver and Governour of his Church I say if he had not been in very great haste indeed and giddy withall in his brain or in some distraction He would have taken notice of Christ and have thought him and his blessed Apostles and seventy Disciples and those likewise that were baptized by John with Christs Mother Brethren and Sisters worthy to be esteemed a formed Church or Churches yet he and his brethren passe by them all saying we take no notice of them as formed into a Church or churches so that it is no wonder they at this day take no notice of our Churches and that they absolutely deny them to be formed into a church or churches after the New Testament forme when they do the same to all the beleevers in Christs time Surely that Subject that should passe by his King and Soveraign and all his retinue and Courtiers and take no notice of him and them and should yeild him no reverence would be thought crased in his brain especially if he should in a slighting manner say He tooke no notice of them And all men that should hear such an expression from him would not onely judge such an one a very unbred man and an uncivill fellow but that deservedly he ought to be taught better manners And without doubt a King that should understand of such a Subject if he at any time had need of his favour would reply unto him Sir you woud take no notice of me and my servants go now to those for help that you think worthy to be taken notice of As the Lord said unto the Israelites who when they were oppressed by their cruell enemies and came then flying unto him for his assistance Go saith he to your gods that in your prosperity yee served and seek help from them And truly if the businesse be seriously considered this my brother Burtons and his associates dealing with Christ and his Disciples and Followers is not altogether unlike the dealing of the Israelites with the Lord at least in words For in plain termes they say we take no notice of them as formed into a church or churches so that Christ and his Disciples are very little beholding to those of the congregationall way Certainly the man was in very great haste when he uttered these words or exceedingly distemperd in his brain for otherwise Christ had been worthy to have been taken notice of if his followers had not Our Saviour speaks of some that at the last day shall say unto him Lord Lord have we not preached in thy Name and in thy Name have we not done wondrous works Mat. 7. ver 22 23. To whom Christ saith he will reply Depart from me I know you not And doubtlesse if my brother Burton and his complices deeply repent not of these their words and of all their evill dealing in seducing and mis-leading of the poor people and of making rents and schismes in Church and State but shall still persevere in the errour of their wayes and will not yet take notice of those multitudes baptized by John the Baptist and Christs Disciples and of Christ himselfe and his Followers nor of their brethren at this day through all the Reformed churches as formed into a Church or Churches it is to be feared that whatsoever both he and those of his party shall pretend As that they have preached in his name and done wondrous works in gathering of new churches and preaching up the congregationall way and publishing of new truths and setting up of new lights and placing Christ upon his Throne I say whatsoever they shall in this kinde pretend Except they all repent of this their wickednesse and uncharitable dealing towards all their Christian Brethren it is to be feared that Christ will say to them as he professeth he will say to the others I know ye not depart from me ye that worke iniquity and they all likewise perish For what can any man that hath not resigned his understanding think lesse of this so weighty a businesse but that Christ may say unto them at that day You have taught it in your congregations and printed in your bookes set forth by authority by all your consents and that upon deliberation that you take no notice of all those multitudes that were baptized by John and my Disciples to be formed into a Church or Churches These will he say are your owne words and that in capitall letters nay you deny them to be Christians for so J. S. speaketh page 8 and 9. in the name of all the brethren giving many reasons there to the contrary asserting that by the baptisme of John they were not made Christians much lesse cast into a church mould according to the New Testament forme and least of all that they were all Members of one Christian church at Jerusalem These are his expressions For which he hath been much applauded by all of that fraternity who usually say of him when he rideth through the streets there goeth he that beat up Doctor Bastwicks quarters approving of this good worke of his in unchristianing all those that beleeved in mee and were baptized by the Ministry of my servant John the greatest Prophet that ever was borne of woman and sent by me and my father to baptize them And of Mr. Burton they never speak but in high praises blessing God that he hath answered Bastwicks Book which he writ in defence and maintenace of my honour and for the reputation of all that beleeved in me and were baptized in my name So that all those books that were set forth by those of the congregationall way to my dishonour and the disrepute of my followers are approved of by you all and in them you say you take no notice of those multitudes that were baptized by John as formed into a church or churches Now amongst those that were baptized by John I was one and my Disciples and my Mother and my Brethren c. So that you slight us all and take no notice of us as formed into a Church or churches that is in plain words you are ashamed of us and deny us Now those that are ashamed of me and deny me before men and take no notice of me and my Disciples and of my Brethren and Sisters and Mother and of those that beleeved in me and followed me whiles I was upon the earth to be formed into a church or churches I will be ashamed of them and deny them and take no notice of them before my Father in Heaven to be formed into a church or churches For he that despiseth my Disciples and my Followers despiseth me and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me Yea whosoever shall despise one of these little ones that beleeve in me it were better that a milstone were hanged about his neck and that he were cast into
by and therefore you in this have not set him upon his Throne And to that hell-hatcht charge which you have brought against mee cunningly aspersing mee for a scandalous walker c. I answer that as the Devill spake in the subtill Serpent and belyed God himselfe to our first Parents so the Inventors of this notorious untruth who ever they be are of a serpentine nature into whom the Devill is entered and having a full possession speaketh in them being subtill and active Instruments to report Lyes and I am confident that upon due and just examination it will appeare they are some shamelesse infamous creatures set a worke by the Devill and prompted by Sectaries to defame mee that there by the Gospel my holy profession and the wayes of God might be scandalized in blemishing my good name and to have it with the more credit received hee hath so ordered That you must be the Herauld to proclaime their Devilish defamations yet notwithstanding my innocencie triumphs in the middest of blacke mouthes slanders being fully assured that God in his due time will make a cleare discovery of their wicked designe for hee is above the Devill And before the Lord that seeth the secret thoughts imaginations intentions of all men in truth and faithfulnesse I speake it I can I doe and by Gods grace ever shall wash my hands in innocencie yea I call upon the righteous Judge the God of Heaven and Earth who knowes my innocencie to judge betweene you and mee herein For God is my witnesse that I have indeavoured to walke before him with an honest sincere faithfull and upright heart ever since hee gave mee the knowledge of himselfe And during the time I was in the estate of nature God by his preventing and restrayning grace kept mee from living or delighting in such sinnes whereby any could truly charge me for a scandalous Walker Therefore in the presence of this great God who of his free grace hath Elected Called and Justified me through faith in his Son the Lord Iesus Christ not suffering me to turne aside neither to the right hand nor to the left out of the paths of truth and that lead to holinesse I solemnly protest and hold out my Protestation to the view of the whole World you have most injuriously wronged mee in proclaiming mee to be such an one For I am as blamelesse and free from your calumniations as Naboth was from wicked Iezabels desperate plot wherewith she tooke away his life 1 King 21. 8 9 10. c. and as innocent as Joseph from the false accusations brought against him by his wanton lascivious and shamelesse mistresse Gen. 39. 14 15 16 17 18 which makes me bold to say neither the Devill any of his Instruments no nor your selfe in the words of truth can prove the things whereof you have accused mee I shal here conclude my answer to this Charge with the Apostle Paul's words 1 Cor. 4. 3 4 5. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of mans judgement yea I judge not mine own selfe For I know nothing by my selfe yet am I not hereby justified but he that judgeth me is the Lord. Therefore judge nothing before the time untill the Lord come who both will bring to light the hidden things of darknesse and will make manifest the Councels of the heart and then shall every man have praise of God Brother I have been the larger in my reply to this particular because it is the foundation and main pillar that may seem to hold up all your other Calumnies for if you could prove me to be a Scandalous walker to the shame of the very name of Christian Religion then men might easily be perswaded to beleeve your whole Charg But the foundation being so rotten and unfound the superstructure cannot possibly stand I now proceed to the fourth particular and my Answer thereunto is that no man of truth worth and piety can justly taxe me either with basenesse or barbarism For the fifth particular it is elevated very high and because you have in this exceedingly bestirr'd your selfe I am necessitated for the clearing my self to vindicate the truth of what I have written to be somewhat large in my reply that I may fully answer the Charge you bring against me therein which is very great viz. You accuse me to be one of the greatest Incendiaries in the Land and to prove this you quote two passages in one of my bookes and you bring them as two witnesses for the confirmation thereof the first is in my Preface pag. 28. the second in my Postcript pag. 45. Now these two witnesses of your own say you want but a Judge judicially to pronounce sentence whether these words be not of an Incendiary nature and that in a high degree For who 's so blind as doth not clearly see these fiery flashes and flames to fly in the face of that Army which God hath honoured with many Crowns of admirable Victories both at York at Naseby and at Lamport with the recovery of Leicester Bridgewater Bath c. so as God hath made this despised Army the Preservative of City and Country the Repairer of the breach the Restorer of the pathes to dwell in Thus you Brother this accusation hath a Tower raised on the same Basis the whole Fabrick of your Charge is founded upon and the foundation being deep you dare build so high as if it were possible to over-top truth not fearing the fall of your Babel but God who is Truth it selfe seeing the evill of your intentions hath confounded your Language as he did those builders who sought to get themselves a name Gen. 11. 4 5 6 7. And therefore it will fall notwithstanding the height of its Tower O what a confused relation have you made to prove me an Incendiary I assure you in all you have said men of the clearest eye-sight nay were they Eagle-ey'd they can never discerne any truth where with you make good that Charge which you say is so conspicuous to the view of all men For those two witnesses that you produce thus they speak Preface pag. 28. saith They have the sword now in their hand and they think their party strong enough to encounter any adverse and opposing party and they professe they care not how soon they come to cutting of throats and speak of nothing but the slaughtering and bunchering of the Presbyterians and therefore there is just cause given us to think we may expect better quarter from the very enemies then from the Independents Postscript testifieth that the Independents boast they have such a party in the Kingdome if their own words may be credited as they now think by the sword to be able to make their own laws and have been frequently heard say that they had many abbettors in the Assembly and in both Houses of Parliament and in many parts through the Kingdome besides in all the Armies and they were
originally and primarily from that creature or from such as are as bad as her selfe have you grounded your most unbrotherly and extra judicall judgement against mee and so you have made your selfe party witnesse Iury and Iudge in this your owne cause and which is more have condemned one that is in your opinion without and out of your jurisdiction whereas Paul had taught all Christs Disciples by a Statute Law from Heaven that they should not judge those that are without now you account mee and all the Presbyterians to bee enemies of Iesus Christ and such Saints as Iob would not set with the dogs of his flocke and proclayme us all the sonnes of Belial as your learned Works can sufficiently witnesse and therefore you account us all without and yet you condemne me and that in the face of the whole world as guilty of all those foule crimes you charge me with whereas you had nothing to doe with mee I being out of your jurisdiction I pray tell me courteous Brother whether this your proceeding be to set up Christ as King upon his Throne and be judicially to condemne any Brother when it is apparently manifest by these your actions you transgresse all the Lawes of Christ our King and trample them under your feet for Christ hath taught all his people and subjects saying Matth. 18. If thy brother offend thee tell him of it betweene him and thee c. and againe hee hath said judge not lest yee be judged and againe there shall be judgement without mercy to him that shewes no mercy againe God hath said hee that condemnes the righteous and hee that justifies the wicked they are both an abomination to the Lord whether therefore by all these your proceedings against mee you have not violated all these most holy Lawes and Statutes I shall leave to the judgement of others Brother you may remember in the 17. page of your Booke speaking there what you will doe when you come to my Postscript which you have finely performed you aske mee whether or no when you make mention of it my mind doth not misgive me your words are these which when I mention here say you doth not your mind misgive you for answer I tell you no for I am able to prove every word of that Booke by sufficient witnesse and out of the very Independents writings yea their daily practises have made good every period of it and so farre I am that my mind should misgive mee at the mention of it for doing my duty that I will with all speed print it againe with some little inlargement concerning your New-lights and other of your grolleries But this by the way But because Brother you take that liberty to propound now and then questions to me I will here also use the same freedome with you Therefore tell me I pray the next time I heare from you whether or no your mind doth not misgive you when I mention your bookes and when you thinke what you have done against mee in thus condemning mee and adjudgeing an innocent man and your quondam Fellow-sufferer Brother had you to deale with some man hee would recriminate which would not be for your honour but for the present I content my selfe to have declared my innocency only by the way consider what you did to my reverend Brother Master George Walker a man to whom you were so much ingaged to and when I mention him doth not your heart misgive you But enough of this Now before I conclude this my parley with you I will say thus much concerning your new Courts in your new gathered Churches if this be your way of proceedings there to be witnesse party Iury and Iudge in your owne cause and when you have given sentence against the innocent if ther be no appeale then your Courts are worse and more tyrannicall then that of the High Commission or Star-chamber and for ought I know all such arbitrary Courts as your are and all such arbitrary and unjust Iudges as you are may as well be questioned censured and put downe for all these your illegall unjust and extrajudicall proceedings as either they or any other tyrannicall Courts were and truly it concernes the whole Kingdome now seriously to looke about them and to have a speciall eye to your Jndependent proceedings and Iudgements for if they bee not timely looked unto all the repairing of our breaches and all the restoring of our pathes to dwell in which you make mention of will be no such thing to the poore Presbyterians who cannot already passe quietly in the streets for you nor any man avoyd your uniust censures nor the filth both of your tongues and pens which you cast in our faces every step wee goe The Lord rebuke you for these your revilings Truly Brother I see a divine hand of justice against you in many passages though you looke loftily and speake great swelling words in all which you breath out hell and your own shame the Lord I hope in time will discover unto you all your vanity and sinfulnesse I will say thus much of you that whiles you used the sharpenesse of your parts against the common enemy you were very serviceable to the Church of God but now turning the edge of them against your Christian brethren you have through their sides both wounded your selfe and all those of your party as I am most assured they will all assert Yea I can ascertaine you of this that it is exceedingly admired by many that you having beene some yeares in captivity under the Prelates tyrannie should continue such a trewant in the schoole of affliction as not yet to have learned the lesson of patience so that you cannot digest a merry word or but a conceived Iest But this they are most of all stranged at that out of the height and greatnesse of your spirit you will strike your enemy though it be through the sides of Religion and the Christian cause and truly this your dealing with all your Christian brethren especially with my selfe cals for deepe and serious repentance at your hands For my part I freely forgive you and do professe it is a griefe unto my soul that you have drawn me out with such violence in forcing me to encounter with you by name it 's true the erroneous wayes opinions and false lights under the name of new lately held forth I did and cannot but write against they being contrary to sacred writ yet you my Brother and Quondam Fellow Sufferer I reverenced and did ever love honour and esteem and had it not been to wipe off those black reproaches wherewith you have laboured to besmear me all over making me appear to the world as a man spotted and defiled with scandalous walking an Hypocrite a Persecutor a mad man c. I professe out of tender respect to your person and sufferings as I have hitherto spared your name so I would now have over lookt your false aspersions but seriously considering
this thy Book doth shew for all their talk That in Truths paths thou persever'st to walk Thy blamelesse life and godly conversation They cannot stain with slandrous exclamation Fight still the fight of faith most certainly There is laid up for Thee in heav'n on high A Crown of righteousnesse which at that day The Lord the righteous Judge shall give and say To Thee Come blessed of my Father take The kingdome I prepared for thy sake From the foundation of the world and shall Then Crown thy head with glory immortall S. B. TO The Victorious Worthy M r John Bastwick D r in Physick and Captain in the Presbyterian Army upon His industrious and learned Book intituled The Vtter Routing of all the Independent Army c. TRiumphant Victor Thou hast won the day And Routed Legions too without a fray Or shedding blood Thy deep mysterious skill Hath been always to Cure and not to kill Thou 'st purg'd their melancholy that began To make all Zeal their own complexion Their Il-dependent Choler 's cool'd by thee And Spleen and Sanguine may Religious bee While they take leave to rage and rail upon Thee as thou wert the Whore of Babylon Then thou couragious Captain undertake To vanquish Error for Christ's Churches sake Arm Thee with Samsons strength or Davids thus Like Paul fight Thou with beasts of Ephesus Then sound a charge utterly Rout all those Peace-Church-disturbers Separates that expose Our Zion like to Sodome what they 're able Raze down Christ's Churches to erect their Babel On Thee a furious Rabbie fouly fals Beats up Thy Quarters All their Generals Hanserdo Knollys namelesse I. S. Burton Have not a Scripture weapon that can hurt One Arm'd as Thou art their fury to abide With Arguments by Gods Word justifi'd The Scriptures Thou unvail'st we can behold Their sacred Truths Thy works do plain unfold Their mysteries Thou with th' Apostles keyes Unlockst Christs Churches hidden Treasuries In this Thou hast all Sectaries overthrown Now they 'll cry out of Persecution To whom th' dissenting brethren do accord Who with Hugh Peters keyes Paul Hobsons sword Advance they will boldly march madly on For all Religions a Toleration Which to Christs faithful Spous doth bring great scandal Such wasting New Lights shew Theeves in the candle Who from Christs fold His Church the fat sheep steal Saints Converts Zealots Rich-men in our Weal 'T is better grow in grace like thriving Lambs Then in short time become such hurtfull Rams But Thou well prove'st their sacrilegious theft Christ nor His blest Apostles ever left Them such a Pattern th' issues of thy pen Shews their false Lights to all enlightned men And in their new ways thou hast them pursu'd So close that Thou their Champions hast subdu'd Routed their Army all their force and might They have's to rail They are too weak to fight George Lindsey THE ERRATA In the Epistle to the Reader PAge 1. line 14. expression read expressions P. 2. l. 3. election r. affection ibid. l. 9. new r. knew P. 3. l. 31. Independent r. Independents P. 15. l. 29. unihilate r. annihilate In the Book PAge 6. line 7. papisticiae read papisticae ibid. l. 15. Hrivie r. Privie P. 9. in some copies in divers lines Pounties Porporations Pompanies read Counties Corporations Companies P. 20. l. 20. his time r. in his time ibid. l. 26. in some copies how saith God r. how saith he P. 129. l. 18. Syllogism r. Syllogisms P. 256. l. 18. given or them r. given them or P. 373. l. ult Punies r. Ninnies P. 374. alribiadian r. Alcibiadian P. 635. l. 19. hollownes read holiness The Reader in his wisdome will both discern and pardon the other literal escapes in the printing To the Ingenuous READER Christian Reader WHEN it was but noysed abroad after my returne from my last imprisonment that I was writing against Independency it would exceed beliefe if I should relate the indignation of all that party and their severall expressions of the same against me so that at that time there were no lesse nor fewer ignominious calumnies cast upon mee nor more variety of virulent censures given out against me then were uttered by them all to my disparagement upon the late comming forth but of the Title and Frontispice of the ensuing Discourse many of them affirming that I was a vaine glorious wicked fellow that I was mad that I was a base rogue and that I deserved hanging and that I would never be quiet till I were hanged with innumerable other unchristian expression of like nature So that it seems it is a greater piaculum by farre now to write against the Independents and Sectaries then scandalum magnatum was a few yeares since Truly at that time I could scarce passe by any of them as I cannot at this day without some contumely or other all which I beare with patience And amongst others I could never meet my Brother Burton but he would alwayes after his salutation in a deriding and scornefull manner aske me when my Book came forth telling me that he expected some Monster It seemes he thought I was bringing forth such a prodigious brat as he not long after laid at my doore which though it were a Monster indeed borne with teeth and nayles and did nothing but scratch and bite me yet comming from his loynes my Brother and quondam Fellow-sufferer I gave it entertainment and for the love I beare to him I have ever since danled it upon the knee of my election Now as soone as I had satisfied his expectation and sent him my Booke so long looked for he very liberally expressed his thankes for it and his opinion concerning both it and my selfe and that with many opprobrious words amidst others he asserted I was crased in my braine and that I had need of some hellebore and spake of me as an Apostate and a Persecutor who before he new my differing opinion from him both prayed for me and immoderately praysed me such is the uncertainty of all that is under the Sunne there being no stability in any creature and withall hee triumphed that he would give me a speedy answer making nothing of what I had written as it is usuall with all the Independents to vilipend and slight whatsoever the Presbyterians either speake or write and meeting with an other Independent not many dayes after he told me that there were twenty pens at worke against me and that I should have my hands full And howsoever it was some moneths before I heard from any of them in print yet all that interim they whetted their tongues against me like so many Razors Swords and Arrows to wound me in my reputation yea there was scarce a weapon in all the arsenall of calumny that they used not against me Now after some moneths one Hanserdo Knollys comming to me told me he had writ a moderate Answer unto my Booke complayning that the Presses were all shut against them though the whole Kingdome
that no other meanes ought or could lawfully be used but sweating them with Arguments Whereupon I being very desirous of all mens saving healths but especially of yours in regard of the particular acquaintance I have formerly had with some of you and in regard also I have beene often accused of great ingratitude towards you all though I may truly assert that not any one of you did ever shew me the least courtesie under that notion you now shew your love to any for whiles yee were my familiars yee went on in that way I now walke in and if yee then shewed me any humanity yee ought not now to upbraid me with it for I am not changed but yee I say in consideration of these things and in regard likewise I find by many symptomes the minds of many of you are exceedingly exulcerated and affected with that malady in morality yee make so loathsome in others yee being surcharged with superfluity of choler and malice and not able to containe your selves but breake forth into distemper of words and poure it out in unsavoury language so that yee may well be left to a miserere mei I pray excuse me that I use your owne dialect in all these regards I say but chiefly for your soules good and that all the world may see how gratefull a man I am to you for any former courtesies under whatsoever notion you shewed them mee I being a Phisician and very well acquainted with all your distempers and being very willing also to yeeld my best helpe for the restoring of any of you to your former sanity and soundnesse of mind offer my selfe to be your Phisician in ordinary and to follow the method prescribed by one of your brethren who it seemsknows the best way of curing your severall maladies I shall upon all occasions as I have at this time sweat you with Arguments but chiefly aâ— the times appointed and because it shall not be said I doe it out of a desire of gaine and for lucre sake that I may the better testifie my gratitude to you all I will according to my promise give you my counsell gratis only you must pay my Apothecary for the Phisick who shall use you very reasonably Now I have made good provision of it because some of your way not many weeks since being in Westminster-Hall speaking to a Reverend Presbyterian Minister in a vapouring manner said that the Independents were exceedingly beholding to me and Reverend Mr. Edwards affirming that we bred more Indpendents then any two of the Kingdom besides and this I beleeve to be true not only because I know the honesty of the man but because I find it printed by one of your brethren that Bishop Wren was not more mischievous to the Prelacy then Master Edwards hath beene to the Presbytery and because Master Weld a wonderfull learned man writ unto me not long since wondring who hired me to make so many Independents whose worthy Epistles may happily within these few weeks see the light and in this regard I doe perswade my selfe that those Independents did use such words as these to that Minister in Westminster-Hall The same Minister also related unto me moreover that they said that they understood that I was preparing some physicke for them which they doubted not but would be very operative for the breeding and increasing of Independents and for the strengthning of more and therefore they said they were resolved as soone as ever it was made ready for use they would bestow an hundred pounds upon that and Master Edward's Bookes for to send through the countrey for the breeding of Independents and contented not themselves barely to speake the words but bound themselves by a solemne protestation that they would doe it and therefore that Iâ—might farther make them beholding to me which is also some requitall for all your former courtesies I have provided physick in a very great quantity and challenge your promise for I presume that they were but the mouth of their brethren there being one of your Sagamours in the company at that time a man that cannot deny what was promised Now if you be honest men indeed and men of your word I expect performance according to your promise I will see you shall have reasonable penny worths only I must tell you that I will take order that the physicke be faithfully distributed and sent through the Kingdome into all parts according to your engagement for the breeding of Independents that it be not embezeled I will undertake that it shall carefully be sent to whatsoever places you shall appoint therefore if yee be Saints indeed as yee pretend stand to your word for I have good witnesse of it and doe not you pretend excuses for the declining of the buying of my physick for then I will conclude you are but a company of Bragadochoes neither would I have you as formerly you use to disparage it finding fault with it my method manner of dispensation saying that it is nauseous and that in my rules and directions I am full of tautologies and extravagancies and that it is poore stuffe procuring rather vomiting then sweating and that their tender stomacks and conscences cannot digest such physicke complayning moreover that it is very deare I would not have you now pretend any of these things I say it is not for your honour seeing you have passed your promise to buy it and to send it through the countrey for the breeding of Independents for you should have considered all these things before your engagements which being passed you cannot now with honesty revoke But as for the tautologies and often repetitions you so blame in my method and so much speake of you of all men ought to excuse them you your selves so often using them having little else in all your writings but tautologies and vaine repetitions especially you ought not to blame them in me when those of your partie have occasioned them by your frequent objecting the same things from severall mouths and pens for I had to deale with your whole Armie and with three of your Generals at once who had read without doubt what each other had writ against me and therefore they picking and choosing through my booke what they thought they could best deale with they might have set upon those parts of my Book that the others had said nothing against but they making the same cavils that the others had done they put mee upon severall answers But were it so that they had none of them seene what each other had writ yet they treading in the same steps and answering after their manner to the severall Arguments they opposed I was severally to reply to all their cavils that are materially made to the severall Arguments which I have faithfully done and for my part I thought it no burthen being ever willing yea resolved is often and as frequently as I find poyson laid by any destructive creature to prescribe an
Argument I may gather that the Christian Churches now through the world at least all the reformed Churches may as well be called nationall Churches as the Jewish Church was especially if we looke unto the requisites that make a nationall Church for two things are required for the making of a nationall Church first a nationall agreement in the same faith and worship Secondly a nationall union in one Ecclesiasticall body in the same community of Ecclesiasticall government as now the Church of England Scotland and Ireland have all by covenant bound themselves to maintaine the same faith and worship and by a nationall union and agreement they have accorded to be under a Presbyteriall government and this they all acknowledge to be Gods Ordinance and a way appointed by him of governing his church and that the Presbyterian government is Gods Ordinance the Independents themselves doe acknowledge but they hold only a congregationall Presbyterie and we hold and that from all reason and from the good word of God and from many presidents both Citie classicall provinciall and nationall Presbyteries and oecumenicall also upon occasions for of these kinds of Presbyteries both the Word of God and many Ecclesiasticall Histories doe furnish us with some presidents and therefore for the one wee have divine institution for it and many examples in the Booke of God but wee have neither precept nor example of that of the congregationall way and therefore it is none of Gods institutions nor none of his devices nor composures that I may use some of I. S. his Rhetoricke but a meere figment of their own braine But now I am to answer to something my Brother Burton hath to say concerning the Presbyters of the Church of England who pag. 6. 7. of his Booke If you saith he have not a good Presbyterie where shall hee viz. that is scandalized or offended goe to complaine Hee may goe and appeale higher you will say and what if the higher the worse Good Brother saith hee either provide the people of the Land an honest godly Presbytery that may be as so many Angels to gather out of Christs Kingdome every thing that offends or else let there be a tender care of tender consciences and some provision made for them that they may not be scandalized by being forced to be the companions of the scandalous Thus my Brother Burton Here is a double If propounded meerly to amuse the people for it is not unknowne to all men that the Parliament the great Councell of the Kingdome endeavoureth to cast out all scandalous Ministers so farre as their power extendeth through the Kingdome if by information and sufficient witnesses they can be proved to be such so that every conscientious and intelligible man may see there is very small ground for the doubts and feares either of my Brother Burton or any of that Fraternity that there will not be a good Presbytery set up and as little when they cannot deny but the godly if offended may goe and appeale higher for either he himselfe or they to make such a supposition what if the higher the worse If I should conclude that these doubts were conceived nourished and brought forth out of the wombe of faction my Brother Burton with his complices would call it rayling therefore to avoid ifit be possible their unjust censures I onely say thus much that both hee and all his brethren use an uncharitable way of arguing which is the best construction can be made of it for thus they may traduce any man yea any government or any way of God at pleasure with a detracting if But here lies the mysterie the onely way my Brother Burton and his associats have to advance Independency is to cloud the truth of God under darke expressions and to eclypse those shining Lights the faithfull godly Ministers throughout the kingdom that the Lord hath set up in his Church that so the people may not heare the voice of God speaking in them by which meanes the understandings of many are wrapped up in error obscurity and darkenesse as in a mantle and the ungrounded and unwarrantable notions of Independency are received by them as new Lights they being very pleasing to flesh and blood for man naturally hath an ambitious boundlesse spirit and from the beginning would not be limited by God himselfe and the Independent doctrine being without bounds teaching that it is free for men to beleeve practise and preach abroad their severall opinions calling it liberty of conscience this is such a Light that all the sons and daughters of darkenesse will willingly walke in But should the Independents obtaine their desire whereever this new Light were set up it would prove no other liberty then that which our first Parents Adam and Eve gained for their Rebellion against Gods command which was to inslave themselves and all their posterity to sinne and Satan and most certaine it is that such a liberty as the Independents doe teach seeke and joyning with all sort of Sectaries and Libertines plead and stand for would bring confusion and an irrevocable curse on those Kingdomes and countries as shall tolerate so great abominations and cause the Lord who hates Laodicean Lukewarmenesse in Religion to spue them out of his mouth Revel 3. 15. 16. But before I passe on I will take this liberty to say unto my Brother Burton that whatsoever with his Ifs hee can plead against our Presbyters may be said with much more and with farre better reason against the independent Presbyters if they be wicked or hereticall for from them there is no appeal for reliefe by any amongst them never so much wronged and therefore all such kinds of arguing against our Presbyters is as altogether uncharitable so but trifling But my Brother Burton cals upon me to provide the people of the Land an honest and godly Presbyterie from whence it appeares that in his and his brethrens account all the Orthodox faithfull and godly Presbyters in the Land at this day who differ from the opinions they have lately received are neither honest nor godly for if there be as most certaine it is there are many honest godly Presbyters provided for the people of the Land it is strange he should speak in such a manner as if they were altogether wanting for so his words doe intimate for why otherwise should he make such a request to me of providing an honest godly Presbyterie if he or they beleeved wee had a godly Presbytery already who notwithstanding he knows hath no power to performe it Truly all his Argumentations are very uncharitable no way beseeming a Brother for charity is kind and thinks no evill 1 Cor. 13. 4. 5. But were it so that it might be taken pro confesso that ther were not any such set up in this land which were to deny the Suns shining at noon-day did hee and the Independents indeed and in truth unfainedly desire such a Presbyterie should be set up established why
leaving the poore sheepe in the wildernesse I say when all these things are evident out of the holy Scripture it necessarily followeth when Diotrephes was an Elder and Presbyter in that Church Saint Iohn writ unto which Master Knollys confesseth that he had there his particular congregation and therfore there was no neede of making any mention of it for very common reason will dictate thus much to any man that if any great grasier have ten or twelve thousand sheepe and many severall walks and places of pasturage to feed them in and hath severall pastours to looke unto them all as not a few Shephards can feede ten or twelue thousands sheepe and gives them all a charge in common of looking to his sheepe and feeding them although all those severall pastours are to have a generall care of all those sheep that have his marke upon them and that are within the limits of his severall walks and grasing places yet it is to be understood that every one of them hath his severall flocke committed to him in speciall for he must not be idle over the which he is to have the particular inspection and care for the well ordering of it with this limitation that he may not wrong the flocke or do any thing contrary unto his Masters pleasure or to the dammage or prejudice of his other fellow Pastours or their flocke All this I say good reason will dictate to any rationall man and dayly experience will confirme it In the same manner things were ordered in the primitive and Apostolicall Churches all whose Elders and Pastours in them had the charge of the severall flocks committed to them in common all the which they were to governe communi consilio presbyterorum as it is by all the Independents themselves confest for all those Churches were Aristocratically and Presbyterianly governed and therefore according to the wisdome and common councell of their Elders this Presbyter had the charge of the sheepe of such a ward or walke committed unto his care and that Elder had such a Circuit committed unto his charge and a third Elder had such a precinct committed to his cure and so of the rest with this proviso alwayes that all things of publicke concernment and that tended to the common good both of sheep and Pastours should be ordered by the joynt and common councell of the severall and respective Presbyters in an orderly and well regulated way for all things in the Church were to be done in order and decency and uniformitie which could never have been if every Pastour and Presbyter and every particular congregation under them severally would have governed as pleased themselves without any reference to the Colledge or common counsell of all the Presbyters which was the failing of Diotrephes here for which he was greatly blam'd by Saint Iohn And that all those Churches were to be governed by their severall Presbytries and that the people were not to intermeddle with the government of them Master Knollys himselfe in the third page of his pamphlet and in the eleventh of the same doth accord who citing my words in my introduction to my booke deduceth from them foure conclusions which I shall by and by set downe after I have related the grounds of them Before saith he the Doctor comes to proove his four particular Propositions he saith it will not be amisse in generall to take notice that all the Churches we read of in the new testament were aristocratically and Presbyterially Governed and were all Dependent upon the severall Presbyters and produceth divers places of Scripture to prove the same and two sheets are spent wholly in proving thereof from the 12 page to the 29. These words Mr Knollys quoteth out of my book Now hear his answer All which saith he should it be granted onely proves First that in every City or Church there was a Presbytery For they Ordained them Elders in every Church Act. 14. That thou Ordain Elders City by City Tit. 1. v. 5. Secondly that as there were Apostles and Elders in the church of Jerusalem so there were Elders in the church of Ephesus Acts the 20. ver 25. and in the church of Corinth and in the church of Galatia and Philippy c. Thirdly that those severall churches were dependent upon their several Presbyteries and they were to obey them who had the rule over them Hebr. 13. 7. 17. 24. Who were their guids obey your guids Fourthly that this Presbyterian church Government God hath appointed as his Ordinance to be continu'd to the end of the World the which whosoever resisteth resisteth the Ordinance of God These are the foure conclusions Master Knolleys gathereth out of my arguments but with all adds saying that all this doth not prove that this Presbyterian Church government is dependent upon a supreame judicature to the Decrees of which they must submit themselves and their churches This saith Mr. Knollys doth not follow but of that in its due place In the mean time it will be much to the purpose a little to consider his expressions All which saith he should it be granted proves First c. to wit the four conclusions now layd down in this place I intreat the Reader to behold the vanity of the man in so speaking all which shâ—uld â—t be granted as if he did me a great courtesie and favour to yeeld unto me that which the holy Scripture in exâ—resse woâ—ds declareth o be the will and pleasure of God and that which I had out of the blessed word of truth sufficiently ev need and which no man can deny except he will deny the Scripture and Word of God which hath perspicuously and in fo mall termes set own that there was a Colledge Presbyte ie of Elders orda ned and constituted in very Church or City who were to have the rule over the people in their severall congreâ—ations within their â—râ—cin â—s w ch M Knollys himself consenteth unto as is evident by his 4 conclusions So that if ever there had been any time of denying or not granting that all the Churches of the New Iestament were all Arâ—stocratically and Presbyterianly to be govern'd and were so many severall Eccle aâ—â—icall Corpo ations and that all those Scriptures I had produced for the proof of the same had not been rightly applyed and alleadged now had been the time when this businesse was in question and agitation for Mr Knollys to have shewen his skill and to have produced the reasons of his dislike and gain-saying but when he confirmed what I proved as is manifest from his four conclusions it is a great folly in the man to say all which should it be granted when he himselfe acknowledgeth as much and in expresse terms in the eleventh page of his book hath these words It is not denyed saith he by the brethren meaning the Independents that the Presbyters in all Churches were the men in the Government of the Churches in which they were Elders These are
The summe of my Arguments is this Where there was an infinitemultitude or a mighty City of beleevers there they could not all meete together in one place or roome or in one congregation to injoy all acts of worship for edification but in the Church of Ierusalem by the very baptisme and preaching of Iohn there was an infinit multitude and a very City of believers ergo they could not all meete together in any one congregation This is the sum of my first Argument The second is this Where there was such an infinite company and multitude of Christians and believers as kept a tyrannicall King in awe and all the Magistrates and Elders in whose hands was all the power and authority and struck such a terror into them all as they durst not exercise their cruelty and tyranny over them though they were their inveterate enemies there of necessity the number of them must be so great as they could not all meet together in one place or congregation to partake in all Acts of worship But in the Church of Jerusalem there was such a company of believers by the very baptisme of Iohn ergo they could not all meete together in any one place or congregation This is the summe of my arguments which I made good out of the Word of God and from sound reason as they that have read my booke with judgement I am confident will acknowledge Now heare how J. S. setteth them downe with his answer to them pag. the 8. and 9. of his booke The Doctors first proposition is saith he that there were many Congregations and severall assemblies in the Church of Jerusalem c. for proofe whereof saith he he bringeth the multitudes of Converts to Iohns Baptisme the people of Jerusalem all of them and all Iudaea c. whereby saith he all became Christians or members of the Christian Church for Iohns baptisme was into Iesus Christ and the very same with that of the Apostles Thus I. S. sets downe my Arguments which I affirme is not candidly done of him for the ignorant Reader cannot see into the strength of my arguments they being delivered in such obscure tearmes and set down also to the halves the whole truth not being specified For not one of ten thousand had ever seene or read my book I dare say not one of an hundred of the Independents had ever vouchsafed so much as to looke into it for I was made so odious unto them by their blasting language as they abhorred my very name with all howsoever they boasted at the first coming of it out that there were twenty pens at worke in answering of it yet not one of them ever appeared till three moneths after it was printed Now all the Copyes that were printed were all gone in one weeke so that the answers coming out so long after and my arguments not being known to the people and being in this obscure manner and in such darke expressions and but to the halves set down every vulgar understanding can never see into the weight and strength of them especially they having not my booke before them And to say the truth all the Independents ordinarily use this method in their pretended answers as first to let the bookes they reply unto be forgotten and after that to blurte out something against them concealing the truth and then they crow out as victors and conquerers that they have beate up our quarters and puld downe the pillars of our discourse as I S. doth vainly in this his Pamplet when it will appeare to all intelligible men that he hath onely cast a squib or two at them and then as a meere fresh water Souldier speedily ran away and left that worke to others as he unaduisedly in the tenth page and in his wise Epistle confesseth sayning indisposition of body when indeede it was his want of wit learning honesty and courage As I haveset downe the sum of my Arguments and compared his expressing of my meaning with it I will also set downe the summe of his answer to them which he giveth in the name of all the Independents saying we answerd to your reason and then set downe his own words in their full length that all men may see my faire dealing with him For I. S. doth not here deny my minor as Master Knollys did or accuse me of false Musters as he vainely and impiously doth in his answer to my second Arguments But plainly denieth that those that were baptized by Iohn Baptist were Christians to whom my brother Burton assenteth page 16. of his book saying that those beleevers that were baptized by Iohn Baptist into Christ to come according to the Papists doctrine were not formed into a Christian Church or Churches as after Christs resurrection Christians were These are my brother Burtons formall words who not only assenteth to I. S. in this his opinion but also bringeth in the authority of the Papists to confirme this their doctrine and so in this the Independents agree with the Papists to overthrow the truth and to maintain their abominable errors And this I conceive was the cause that moved my brother Burton in the ninth page of his booke in the beginning of his answer to say `as for your indefinite enumeration of those multitudes baptized by Iohn the Baptist and Christs Disciples we take no notice of them This is his expression there concerning the which in due place Surely if my brother Burton had thought them Christians he would have demeed them worthy to have been taken notice of but in this he agreeth with I. S. and the Papists Now I will give you the summe of I. S. his Arguments in way of answer by which he denieth that those that were baptized by Iohn the Baptist were Christians The first is because saith he they were baptised into Christ that was to dye and not dead therefore in his dialect they were no Christians The second they were not baptized with the holy Ghost and with fire therefore thy were no Chrstians The third they were no more Christians then the Iewes that passed through the red Sea but they were no Christians ergo they also that were baptized by Iohn were no Christians The fourth The baptisme of Iohn was not perfect ergo those that were baptised by him were no Christians The fifth those that were baptized by Iohn did not only hasitate but were scandalized at the true Messiah and under the forme of Iohns baptisme did fight against the true baptisme and baptiser the Lord Jesus ergo they were no Christians Sixthly they that were baptized by Iohn were not cast into a Church mould according to the New testament forme neither were they members of one Christian Church at Jerusalem ergo they were not Christians and this Argument is brought in by way of a corallary This must needs be the scope of his answer or else he sayth nothing to the purpose in denying my Arguments which were not only to prove that those
brought into Christs fold and church and by that worke of conversion they were added to it as he that should this day take any of our Ministers and faithfull Pastors sheep out of their folds and steale them away as too too many of the Independent Ministers daily do and bring them into their new congregations may not that Independent Minister without any marvilous anticipation or mistake or without any error truly be said to have added so many more to his new church when the number of his members is thus increased And if another Minister be joyned with him as a teacher in that congregation or succed him if he also shall run plundering about both city and country as a gifted brother and bring in a great many more poore silly sheepe into his fold then the other did as they are notable cunning theeves may not it truly be said of him and that without any marvilous anticipation and mistake that he also added unto the church when still the the number is daily increased I am confident that all men of sound reason will say there is no error in all this And therefore I hope by all the judicious I shall be free from any blame or error in that I said those that were converted by Christ and made Disciples by his Ministry were added to the church and to those that were formerly converted by the Baptist But saith J. S. how could Christ make mo Disciples then Iohn Out of whom should he make them saith he when Iohn had swept all along with him as the Doctor affirmeth pag. 32. Not taking it Synecdochically Thus he shewes his acumen or rather his vanity in contradicting the Scripture and abusing me For he that hath ever read my booke and looks but in the 31 page toward the lower part shall finde these words That Jerusalem went out to Iohn and was baptized it must therefore by a Synecdoche be taken for all the common people promiscuously or for a mighty multitude of all sorts and of all ranks of people and of all professions as Publicans Souldiers and the ordinary inhabitants These were my very words there And therefore I. S. saying that I took not the word Synecdochically belyeth me befooleth himselfe and abuseth the reader and fights with his own phancy But for answer to his whibling Cavill I say Christ converted those he made his Disciples and Schollers out of the remmant or remainder of those that were yet unconverted in Ierusalem and in that work he added more unto that church which though the mother church as the other were Daughter churches through all Iuda yet it was but a particular church in that Nationall church for the being a Nationall church doth not exclude as this man fondly conceits particular churches from bearing the name of church no more then the Catholike visible church doth deny the name of church to any particular churches because they being similar parts do partake both of the name and nature of the whole as all the learned and Orthodox Divines do hold And therefore taking Ierusalem Synecdochically as I then did it is also here to be so taken and then Christ did make mo Disciples out of the people of Jerusalem that remained yet unconverted then Iohn had done before him and added them unto the church at Ierusalem that particular mother church in that Nationall church which as it was at that time in respect of morall worship governd by a Colledge of Elders or Presbyters as the Scripture everywhere relateth which is called a church so it was ever after governed by a Presbytery all those Synagogues and severall churches being all combind together under the rule and goverment of that Presbytery and making all but one church within its precinct after which manner all the other city churches throught Iudea following the example of this mother church were ever to be governed to the end of the world and this is indeed the true chuch mould according to the New Testament forme that all churches ought to be cast into if we will imitate the government of the mother church Ierusalem and all the daughter churches both in Judea and Israel as that of Samaria and into this mould did the Baptist and Christ cast all they converted Therefore when I said that Christ made more Disciples in Ierusalem then Iohn and that he added them unto that Church I speake nothing but that I have warrant for out of the good Word of God and the Scripture of truth and which is sufficiently backt and corroborated also by all sound reason And therefore it is wickednesse in I. S. to say that in so speaking it is a paradox For if it be a matter of ludibre in me and a paradox to say that Christ made more Disciples then Iohn Then likewise it is a paradox and matter of laughter in the holy Evangelist For he in formall words saith That Iesus made and baptized moe Disciples then Iohn I referre my selfe therefore unto the judgement of all honest godly minded men whether Saint Iohn be not as well censured and traduced by this vaine and wicked fellow as my selfe and whether in his so speaking he doth not give the Spirit of God the lye And his second paradox is as vaine and childish and impious as this where he saith is not this a marvelous anticipation and mistake to apply that which was done by the Disciples after Christs ascension unto the ministery of Christ himselfe For answer let I. S. take notice that in saying Christ made â—mo Disciples then the Baptist and in making them added them unto the Church at Ierusalem There is no marvelous anticipation or mistake as I. S. unlearnedly inferrs for in giving unto Christ his due honour and affirming he added unto the Church that was then in Ierusalem I have both the Scripture and reason for it and in so speaking I detract nothing from the honor and dignity of the Disciples for it is no error in any man to apply that unto Christ Ministery viz. the conversion of men and the adding of them to the church which worke properly and primarily belongeth unto him though in a Metaphoricall sense it may also be attributed unto the Apostles and Ministers of the Gospell And therefore the mistake is in I. S. and not in me for he applyes that unto the Disciples which was done by Christ for it is said the Lord added unto the Church dayly such as should be saved It was done by Christ and not the worke of the Apostles but instrumentally and therefore I. S. is a prevaricator in many respects sinning both against God and man for here he giveth that honour which is peculiar unto Christ unto the Disciples and then he falsly accuseth me of an error and mistake when there is none and then would make me guilty of his own sins which I am free from as all they that read my booke in the page quoted by him may see and this is not all but in
it as the insuing places sufficiently prove Rom. 16. ver 17 and 18. Now I beseech you brethren saith the Apostle marke them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned and avoyde them 1 Cor. chap. the 5. ver 11. But now I have writ unto you saith Saint Paul not to keep company if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator or covetous or an Idolater or a raylor or a drunkard or an extortioner with such an one no not to eat 1 Tim. chap. the 6. ver the 3. and 5. If any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome words even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the doctrine which is according to godlinesse from such withdraw thy selfe and 2 Tim. chap. 3. ver 1 2 3 4 5. In the last dayes saith the Apostle shall perilous times come For men shall be lovers of their own selves covetous boasters proud blasphemers disobedient to parents without naturall affection covenant or truce-breakers false accusers or make-bates incontinent fierce despisers of those that are good trayterous heady high-minded lovers of pleasures more then lovers of God hauing a forme of godlinesse but denying the power thereof from such tâ—rne away for of this sort are they which creep into widdowes houses and lead captive silly women laden with sinnes c. Tit. 3. ver 10. A man that is an hereticke after the first and second admonition reject saith the Apostle 2. John ver 10. If there come any unto you saith Saint John and bring not the doctrine of Christ receive him not into your house neither bid him God speed for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evill deeds And Gal 1. ver 8 9. If we or an Angell from Heaven saith the Apostle preach otherwise then that which we have preached unto you let him be accursed as I said before so I say now againe if any man preach unto you any other Gospell then that you have received let him be occursed Out of all the which places and many more that might be produced we are taught to shun and decline the society and fellowship of all such Christians as are corrupt in their doctrine or manners and such as either preach or practise otherwise then they have precept or example for in the holy word of God especially we are to have no communion with them when they not only preach another way to Heaven then that which Christ and the holy Prophets and blessed Apostles have chalked out unto us and delivered unto the Church but have joyned themselves in a wicked and unwarrantable Covenant to persist and continue in this practice for they are no Saints But such are those of the Congregationall way whose Teachers and Members are combined together to persevere in their wicked practices and courses and therefore by expresse command from Heaven we are to have no communion with such unlesse we will be found fighters against God and partake in their punishments And these places of holy Scripture with these reasons shall suffice for the proofe of the Major proposition For the Minor that the churches and assemblies of those of the congregationall way consist of Raylers Revilers Slanderers and covenant-breakers c. it is evident and well knowne to all such as are acquainted with the practise of the Independents and are verst in their doctrine and have read their Pamphlets which consist chiefly of errors untruths and right-downe raylings as amongst others those of my brother Burton and Iohn Lilburne not to mention the Pamphlets of all the other Independents the very names of which would make a booke in all the which there is little other but rayling and dangerous novelties Some of my brother Burtons and Iohn Lilburnes expressions with an other or two more which write in the name of all the Independents I will produce that by the mouth of two or three of their witnesses the truth of their proceedings in their Raylings Errors and Lyes and bad practises may be yet more evident My brother Burton in his Vindication hath these insuing words against all the Presbyterians both Ministers and people and first against the Ministers of whom hee saith that they deny disclaime and preach against Christs kingly Government over mens consciences and churches so that such a conversion as is wrought by them comes not home to whole Christ and such with their converters doe deny Christs kingly Government or at least and best they are converted but in part and that maine thing is wanting to wit Christs kingly Office And in his Vindiciae veritatis hee accuseth mee pag. 21. for taking Christs name in vaine because in my Booke I asserted that the Ministers of the church of England set up Christ upon his Throne which for mee to affirme hee saith it is to take the name of Christ in vaine his words are these And here saith he I challenge our brother for taking Christs name in vaine when insteed of finding Christ set upon his Throne in their congregations we find there no more but an Image such as Michal had made up insteed of King David or as those that in mockery made of Christ a Pageant King stripping him and putting on him a scarlet Robe and on his head a Crowne of Thornes and in his hand a reed saluting him with Haile King of the Iewes with which title over his head they crucified him therefore saith he those passages quoted out of my Booke will stand good against their opposers These are his words against all the Ministers of the Church of England Now of all the people that are not of the congregationall way and of their new Assemblies my brother Burton in his Vindication hath these words Wee exhort them saith he to set up Christ King in their hearts Wee exhort them to become and professe to be those Saints of whom Christ is King for hee is King of Saints Revel 15. 3. but they will not beleeve us saith hee they will not depend upon Christ as the only Law-giver and King over their consciences Now what would you have us to doe in this case saith hee baptize the Infants of such parents as will not in this respect professe or confesse Christ to be their King why doe you not know saith hee that no Infants have any title to Baptisme that are not within the Covenant visibly and how are they within the Covenant visibly but by vertue of their parents faith outwardly professed and what outward profession of faith is there in their parents that refuse Christ for their onely King that are ashamed or afraid to professe to be in covenant with Christ as their King if therefore the parents professe not yea refuse thus to be in visible covenant can the children be said to be in visible covenant and so to have a right in Baptisme the externall Seale of the Covenant here is an obex a barre put These are my brother Burtons owne
words which I have set downe at large omitting many other such expressions the summe of them briefly is this that all the Ministers of the Church of England that are not in their combination doe deny disclaime and preach against Christs Kingly Government over mens consciences and churches and are no better then the persecuting Jewes that made a mocke scorne and ludibry of Christ and that all the people under their Ministry are men unconverted or at least converted but in part wanting the maine thing to wit Christs kingly office men visibly out of the covenant of grace who have not so much as an outward profession of faith who deny Christ to be their King to whose persons and infants the very Sacraments and seales of grace with all church communion may and ought to be denyed Now I referre my selfe to the judgement of all learned and impartiall Christians whether there can be uttered with the tongue or pen of men any more injurious unjust raâ—lings and revilings or more untrue and false accusations against their brethren For all those godly Christians through the thrâ—e Kâ—ngdomes can witâ—esse the contrary who by the pâ—eaching of the Word and Gospel have beene converted by the Ministry of the chuâ—ch of England Yea the Independents themselves and my brother Burton if they will no belye the truth must acknowledge next under God their conversion to the Ministers of the church of England for none but converts and beleevers are to be admitted into their new congregations and I never yet heard that the Independent Ministers converted any and therefore when my brother Burton accuseth all the Ministers and beleeving people of the church of England to be enemies of the Lord Jesus when they all indeavour to set him up upon his Throne as King it is a most horrid wickednesse in him and those of his party to beare false witnesse against their Neighbours and so to calumniate and revile the true servants of the Lord by which they come to take the Devils office upon themselves and become all of them false Accuâ—ers of the brethren Raylers and Persecutors and Seducers and therefore no Saints Yea it is ordinary with my brother Burton as can be proved both to speake and print untruths and notorious falsehoods but passing many of them by in some of his last bookes as Truth shut out of doores and in this his Booke called Vindiciae veritatis which may bee more properly stiled Vindiciae mendacii in the 24. page speaking there most maliciously against learned Master Edwards and my selfe hee saith that hee by his pen and preaching and that I by my pen labour to take an order that the Independents shall have no Pulpits to preach in at all Witnesse saith he that late mis-rule at your towne of Colchester upon your bookes and T. E. his preaching by which words of his hee would make the deluded people beleeve that there was some great Persecution stirred up at Colchester against some Independent Ministers there to hinder them from preaching in their Pulpits which is a most notorious falshood the contrary of which is true for the Independents made a mis-rule in the very Church against Master Edwards and openly reviled him in the congregation using many rayling speeches against him and that against all the Laws of Christianitie and civilitie and had almost by their barborous carriage against him raysed a tumult in the Towne to the disturbance of them all had it not timely by the wisedome of some beene prevented So that it may easily be perceived what the Independents would doe against the Presbyterian Ministers if the authority were once wholly in their hands when they so timely begin where their faction is any thing powerfull yet such is the boldnesse or rather impudencie of these men that when they are the only Persecutors of others and the Raysers up of tumults and commotions against the faithfull Ministers of the Gospel they falsely spread it abroad that they are persecuted by us and not suffered to come in our Pulpits as my brother Burton doth here accuse the good people of Colchester and those of Alderman-bury as if they also had shut truth out of doors when notwithstanding it can by a cloud of witnesses from Colchester bee proved that the Independents made the mis-rule and that my brother Burton shut himselfe out of doores at Aldermanbury and yet hee untruly accuseth them of that crime of persecution and this is the generall practise of all the Independents falsely to accuse and calumniate their brethren and my brother Burton and Iohn Lilburne are Masters in this art and therfore surely they can be no Saints without Devils be Saints for so the holy Scripture calleth such I have cited some of my brother Burtons expressions I shall now set downe some of Iohn Lilburnes language concerning both the Ministers and beleevers of the church of England In his Letter to my brother Prynne to omit many of his rayling and violent calumnies there against the Ministers hee saith that they are the sworne enemies of Iesus Christ yea the profest enemies of their anoynted Christ and in his one of his Pamphlets which he made in prison which he lately againe set forth upon more mature deliberation hee hath many most unchristian bitter and unsavery expressions and so apparently untrue that every child can say hee is a notorious calumniator and Lyer Some of them I will here set downe amongst other things hee speaketh of the church of England and of the faithfull hee thus uttereth himselfe affirming That the Church of England is a true whorish Mother and that they that are of her were base begotten and bastardly children and that shee neither is nor never was truly married joyned or united unto Jesus Christ in that espousall band which his true churches are and ought to be bnt is one of Antichrists nationall whorish Churches and Cities spoken of Revel 16. 19. c. That the Church of England is false and Antichristian and as shee is a false and Antichristian church shee can never make true Officers and Ministers of Iesus Christ and absolutely denies that conversion and confirmation and building up in the wayes of God are wrought by the Ministry of the church of England for how saith he can they build them up in that which they themselves are ignorant of and enemies unto for as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses so doe these men also resist the truth c. and further asserteth that as hee hath taken paines by the word of God and demonstrable arguments grounded thereupon to prove the church of England antichristian so hee promiseth to all the world that hee will in the strength of the Lord of Hosts for ever separate from Church Ministry and Worship of England and all and every one of them as Antichristian and false And concludes that all the Ministers of the church of England are not true Ministers of Christ but false and Antichristian Ministers and that our
at amongst them or tolerated or any other Religion but that which the Lord our God hath appointed and established in his blessed word and in that they walk and persevere they decline not in their love to it they go not backward with Demas to imbrace the present World nor with Hymeneus and Philetus they will deny no truth of God nor with any Hereticks innovate any thing in their Religion but they walk uprightly to the marke of the high calling in Jesus Christ They stand not still neither nor make no pause in their way but they are ever journying and in the action of well doing going from strength to strength till they come to the heavenly Zion they go on cheerfully in their Religion yea they run the race set before them with patience and that through thick and thin of all afflictions and persecutions and abate not their pace casting aside every thing that presseth down as the love of the world the love of honours and riches the love of pleasures the love of profits the love of friends and all earthly emoluments yea and the sin that sticks so close unto them all their hereditaty and inbred corruptions yea they reject likewise all novelties in Religion nothing can hinder them from walking uprightly in the old way God has appointed them to walk in but in despite of all impediments they not onely walk but run the race and the whole race set before them Looking upon the author and finisher of their faith Jesus Christ who for the glory that was set before him indured the crosse despised the shame and is now set down at the right hand of God in heaven Heb. 12. 2. He made that good confession to the death before Pontius Pilate and witnessed the truth All they therefore that are conformable to Jesus Christ and desire to walk in his steps and that are Saints indeed and the generation of the Just can never indure a Toleration of all Religions for that is not to walk uprightly with their God nor after Christ example for Christ whipt the Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple and would not tolerate them but layd corporall punishment upon them for their evill doing and preached against the Scribes Pharisees and Saduces and all erroneous Sects in his life time and after he was ascended into heaven he wrote unto the Churches of Pergamos and Thyatyra sharply reproving them for suffering and tolerating amongst them any other Religion then that he had appointed and for but conniving at any novelties in Doctrine and Religion They therefore that follow the ill example of those of the Church of Pergamos and Thyatyra and not onely suffer all manner of Religions amongst them but labour and indeavour to have an indulgence and a toleration for all under the pretence of liberty of conscience they follow not the example of Christ the Prophet of his Church nor the example of Abraham Jacob Ioshua and all the Patriarks and blessed Apostles who abhorred all novelties and tolerations and therefore they walk not uprightly with their God and are not Saints indeed according to Gods own description of a true Saint Now whether therefore the Il-dependents by their practises can challenge this Character to themselves I leave it to the judgement of the learned when they would have a Toleration of all Religions But now to passe on to the second Character of a true Saint He that worketh righteousnesse saith the spirit they that make it their imployment to render to every one their due obedience and subjection to the higher powers Rom. 13. Tribute to whom Tribute Custome to whom custome fear to whom fear honour to whom honour is due and they that will owe no man nothing but love and that love one another knowing that he that loveth fulfilleth the Law they are Saints properly so called v. the 7. In a word all that are Saints indeed in Gods repute worke righteousnesse they first give unto God his true worship and labour for the establishment of that Religion onely that he hath appointed they cannot indure the Toleration of all Religions neither will they connive at or indulge that any way of serving and worshipping of God should be permitted where they have power and ability to hinder it but that which God himselfe hath commanded for they know that that is not to work righteousnesse for that is not to give God his own For he appointed but one Religion and that he challengeth for his own so then they that set up any other but that or tolerate more or allow of a Toleration of all Religions they work not righteousnesse towards God for that is unjustice and a thing highly displeasing unto his divine Majesty as taking his right and authority out of his hand who is King of his Church and substituting themselves in his place which is the greatest injustice and unrighteousnesse in the world and therefore all that are the true Saints indeed and the generation of the just dare not attempt any such unjust thing for they work righteousnesse Again the true Saints in like manner work righteousnesse towards all men they yeeld all subjection to those that are in authority over them and they give the Magistrates their due honour and reverence yeelding unto them all the duties of obedience and subjection and veneration and they yeeld unto the Ministers and all their Brethren the duty of love and their true honour and so are fulfillers of the law of God They therefore that maligne their brethren and detract from their praises and hate them and speak evill of them and of those that are in dignity and authority and raile of those in the Ministry and as much as in them lies endeavour to make them odious to the world by their daily traducing of them and assuming the honour due to them unto themselves and all such as do assent unto them in this their unrighteous dealing they do not worke righteousnesse and therefore in Gods dialect they are not Saints indeed nor the generation of the just for it is great injustice to detract from any their due honour Now I appeal unto the judgment of any intelligible man whether or no those that write defamatory books and daily utter injurious and reproachfull words against the great councell of the Kingdome traducing them before all the people and accusing them of injustice and of exercising a lawlesse and an arbitrary government over the people proclaiming them tyrants and as bad as Strafford and the Bishop of Canterbury and guilty of the same crimes and that at pleasure can impeach any of the Parliament and accuse them to the people as traitors and such as keepe correspondency with the enimy and are betrayers of their liberties and those that do allow of such men favouring them and incouraging them by their countenance or connivance I say I appeal to the judgement of any whether they that do or assent to such doings do work righteousnesse when they do apparently
they spake not the truth in their hearts all such therfore as contrive all the mischief they can against those whom at every word they call brother and good brother yet write whole bookes to the defaming of them and killing of their good name which is worse then the murthering of their very bodies they are so farre from being Saints as they are like Cain that wicked one that slew his brother ver 12. all such therefore as say one thing and practise the contrary are double-minded men and a Generation not of the just but unjust for they speake not the truth in their hearts when therefore all the Independents in words pretend love unto their Presbyterian brethren and seeme to honour the Parliament and the Scots and their godly brethren the Ministers and yet seeke by all meanes possible they can to render them all odious to the people to baptize them into the hatred of all men and write scurrilous and defamatory books against them all to this very purpose and rejoyce at any evill that happens to any of them or to heare of any breach or division amongst them and labour to make it greater and will not so much as pray with them or pray for them but have beene heard in their publick congregations say and that in their prayers Now Father we should come to pray for the Parliament and the Assembly but they are not worthy the prayers of the Saints thus they speake unto God himselfe of the Parliament and Assembly in their owne congregations and will not vouchsafe them so much as their prayers as can sufficiently be proved and yet to the world they pretend they honour the Parliament and Assembly and love all their Presbyterian brethren and wish them all happinesse when all their actions words and Pamphlets proclame the contrary for it is well knowne that the whole scope of most of their imployments is to traduce the Parliament and their government and to make the Scots and all the Presbyters their brethren the most hatefull people in the world as if all their indeavours were to bring the people under an unsupportable slavery and a greater yoake of tyrannie then that of the Prelates this is their very language in all their discourse and writings yea often in their meeting places by which they have so inraged the people every where against all our godly and painefull Ministers that they are looked upon with an evill eye through Citie and Countrey and yet they pretend love unto them in words and call them brethren at every turne and their godly brethren and yet would sterve them if they could and both in their writings and preaching and disputes labour to take away their good name yea their livelyhoods their Tythes the only maintenane by which they should support themselves and their families all which their dealing is abominable dissimulation So that when they most court them and faune upon them with the title of brother and good brother and shew them some outward courtesies they had most need to take heed of them for then they plot mischiefe and speake not the truth in their hearts and therefore the Ill-dependents are no true Saints for they speake not the truth in their hearts But to goe on to the other characters of the true Saints they saith the Holy Ghost verse the 3. Back bite not with their tongue nor doe evill to their neighbour nor take up a reproach against their neighbour In this verse there are three other characters together of true Saints as in the former ver The first they backbite not with their tongue the second they doe no evill to their neighbour the third they receive not a reproach against their neighbour they will not entertain indure or take up or beleeve an evill report against their brethren for they that are Saints indeed know that they that receive stoln goods into their houses or doe assent unto a Thiefe are as equally guilty as the thiefe that tooke them away now all such as make it their chiefe imployment to traduce their neighbours and defame them and speake evill of them and fouly reproach them with all manner of contumelious and disgracefull language calling them the profest enemies of Jesus Christ and his Kingdome the Antichristian brood the lims of Antichrist using a thousand such scurrilous and unchristian reproaches against the Presbyterian brethren in tongue and pen and doe all manner of evill unto them in word and deed and write libellous bookes against them and receive and imbrace all manner of evill reports against them yea hunt after such and seeke for them that they may have matter of slander against them and give eare to Tale-bearers and busie bodies against the word of God and will imbrace the acquaintance of the most impious peoyle in the world as can be proved and give eare and credit to the calumnies and reproaches of profest Atheists in any thing they shall falsely report against any of their Presbyterian brethren all such in Gods dialect are no true Saints for they that are Saints indeed back-bite not with their tongue they doe no evill to their neighbour nor they will not receive a reproach against their neighbour much lesse against those that are in authority and dignity Now I say if it can be proved that the Independents make it their ordinary and daily practise not only to traduce back-bite and doe evill and receive a reproach against their fellow brethren but doe all these evils also against those that are in dignity and authority and are made Rulers and Governours of the people and over themselves it follows that they that doe all these evils and all those that assent unto them in their so doing are not Saints indeed in Gods esteeme now that the Il-dependents are guilty of all these crimes the many Pamphlets lately set forth by them as those published by Iohn Lilburne and my brother Burton and all the other scurrilous and libellous Bookes set forth by those of that party and countenanced by them doe sufficiently witnesse And here I shall desire of any man ingenuously to tell mee what it is to back-bite their neighbour and do evill to them and to receive a reproach against them if speaking defamatory words of them all and writing and publishing of libellous Bookes against the great Councell of the Kingdome and those in authority be not to back-bite their neighbour Certainly such words and books as accuse the Parliament of Injustice tyrannie and of exercising an arbitrary power over the people against Magna Charta and the Petition of Right and the priviledges of the subject and make them all as bad as Strafford and the Prelate and such words Pamphlets and writings against the House of Peeres and Commons as tend to the defaming of them and their just power and government and to disaffect the people against them and to stirre up a faction against their just authority and to make them odious to all men
and all those that either speake such words or write or print such Books and Pamphlets and all such as allow of such words and Pamphlets either by their silence or connivence or approbation or by buying and receiving of them into their houses or venting selling and publishing of them and either prayse or like of the authors and contrivers of them and all such as shall scatter and spread such books abroad and shall releeve and support such men in this their evill doing by supplying and furnishing them with moneys or visiting of them and petitioning for their maintenance and allowance in these their wicked practises or by their silence favour them all and every one of them may truly be said and that by divine and humane authority and by the very testimony of my brother Burton to be such as backbite their brethren and they have all of them a great deal to answer for such their doings before the righteous judge of the whole world and in Gods dialect all such as backbite their neighbour with their tongue and pen are no Saints for the true Saints backbite not their neighbour with their tongue Now that it is the generall practise of all the Il-dependents to do this I refer my selfe to those Pamphlets above specified and to their dayly Proceedings their combinings and confederatings of themselves together for this very purpose all which do sufficiently testifie and declare unto the world as well as their dayly publishing through City and Country such words and books as tend altogether for the defaming of the Parliament and the traducing of all their brethren that it is one of their master pieces boldly to calumniate all men that something may cleave and stick Again I demande of any man what it is to do evill to his neighbour if plotting against the life and blood of their neighbours be not to do evil unto them if making rents schismes and factions in Church and State and to vent and publish desperate and dangerous opinions and open heresies all which are works of the flesh leading men to perdition Gal. 5. I ask I say of any man whether the acting of all these things be not to do evill to their neighbours And whether or no to violate all the laws of God and nature upon needlesse and unwarrantable pretences as to divide the husband from the wife the parents from the children the servants from their masters the subjects from their governours and them in authority over them the people and sheep from their Ministers and faithfull Pastors and to labour for a toleration of all Religions in a State and Kingdome yea in many Kingdomes and by this means to bring confusion upon them all I demand I say of any moderate man whether the acting of all these things be not to do evill to their neighbours And whether to ride and run from one end of the Kindom to another to seduce the people and to do their neighbours a mischiefe and by tongue and pen and all manner of infamous language to wrong them to the taking away of their good name which is better then their life be not to do evill to his neighbours Again I demand of any solid Christian whether the indeavouring the taking away all means of livelyhood from the Ministers as their tythes the onely support of their families and the making of them odious by their railing Pamphlets and the hindring Reformation in the Church and the breaking of all promises and covenants with their brethren to the prejudice of the whole Kingdom be not to do evill to their neighbours And whether to raise up false and infamous reports against their brethren the Scots and them in authority and to publish them in word and print be not to do evill to their neighbours And whether the denying of their brethren their very prayers aide help and assistance at any time yea to pray against them and for their confusion be not to do evill to their neighbours I shall here desire of any sober-minded Christian to tell me whether the acting or doing of all these things or any of them or the consenting unto them and allowing of them be not to do evill to their neighbours And I am most assuredly confident that he will candidly acknowledge that the acting of all this is to do evill to their neighbour Now that the Il-dependents dayly practice all these things can be proved by a cloud of witnesses yea all their Actions and Pamphlets can testifie it especially the late conspiracy of many of them against the life of that Honourable Gentleman Mr Speaker of the House of Commons and many more of the High Court of Parliament and their running and riding about to preach up their new doctrines and hereticall opinions to the disturbing of all order in Church and State for the seducing of the people and their running riding and going from place to place to defame and traduce their neighbors for the hindring of them from coming to any imployment by which they might have been useful in their generation to the land of their nativity all these passages I say can witnesse against them and innumerable presidents more of their unchristian proceedings against their brethâ—â—n might be produced and may be proved by numberlesse witnesses besides their owne writings that all of them do evill to their neighbours and that this is the generall practice of the Il-dependents Yea it is notoriously known that there is scarce a meeting of them whether in their festivities or in any of their solemn assemblings of themselves together gether that they do any other great thing amongst themselves but that that tends to the evill of their neighbours in word and deed there scarce issuing any thing out of their mouths but injurious words against them Yea they cannot contain themselves in the very open streets and in the Churches from railing against their Christian brethren as can sufficiently be proved Yea let any Presbyterian accidentally but come into their houses and they will reproach and raile at him And if all this be not to do evill to their neighbours I know not what is to do evill unto them Now in Gods dialect all such as perpetrate any of these actions are not Saints indeed for the true Saints do no evill to their neighbours The Il-dependents may not here pretend that their Ministers can preach and pray well and that those of their fraternity have many of them excellent gifts for gifts are not sufficient to make Saints but grace is that that makes Saints For Saint James and Saint Paul have sufficiently proved That unto all the true Saints for so in the first of the Corinthians ch 13. v. 1. 2. Though I speak saith Paul with the tongues of men and Angels and have no charity I am become as sounding brasse and a tinckling symball And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and though I have all faith so that I could
wee might never looke for happy dayes nay it can be proved that some of the Independent Ministers have made it part of their imployment to run from one place to an other to preach their errors and in their Sermons to bring the Gentry and Nobility into the hatred of the people accusing them as the cause of all our calamities publickly declaming against them as the basest Gentry and Nobility in the world saying in expresse words that howsoever Noble-mens Mothers were knowne yet their Fathers were Grooms or some base fellows that they were nothing but drosse dresse drosse and this they have spake in great and crowded Assemblies all the which speeches if they tend not to make the Nobility hatefull to the people and so by consequence to the ruine and overthrow of them in time I know not what can and whether all this bee not to doe evill to their neighbours I leave it to the judgement of others and how many of the Independents have vilified the great Councell let their bookes be examined and they will say I wrong them not in any thing when I affirm they labour to bring in a confusion of all things yea their words daily at the very Parliament dore can witnesse that howsoever they pretend to honour the Parliament yet they do accuse them of arbitrary and tyrannicall Government and assert that the Lawyers in the Parliament have betrayed the Liberties of the subject and this is their daily language and that it may bee the better knowne it is all extant in their printed Books by all which they do evill to their neighbours Now then if I in my just defence made use of their owne expressions to set downe the wickednesse of their wayes and to discover their bad intentions there was no just cause why any rationall man should condemne mee for it for ridentem dicere verum quid vetat Now that the Independents have so severely censured mee causelessely for this they shew they are altogether partiall and very unjust Judges and whiles they doe the greatest evill unto men that can possibly by the malice of men be done unto them which no true Saints doe for they doe no evill to their neighbours as the Spirit of God saith yet they will condemne others for but making use truly of such expressions as they themselves have falsely and causelessely used against others for I in discribing of them and their proceedings exprest my selfe but in their owne dialect and yet they fill the whole Kingdom with clamours against mee for being but their scholler The time was when I writ my Letany for to make my self and my fellow Prisoners merry in our bands that when many grave men liked it in private yet disswaded mee from making of it publick that those that are now the great Sticklers of the Independent party against all the counsell of my grave friends perswaded me to print it protesting that they thought it would doe the Prelates more mischiefe then any booke that was seriously penned against them and therefore intreated mee by all meanes that I would publish it yea they offered mee to set it forth upon their owne charges and costs and through their importunity they prevayled with mee to give them the copie and it was printed and liked so wel of by that party as they commended mee with all the prayses men could extoll and magnifie a man with as can be proved and they have often profest unto mee that they thought it was the best way of dealing with any enemies of the Church and therefore I conceive that Martin useth so much of this method in his books But indeed there have bin many and grave Divines that have writ many merry and pleasant books against the Prelates in all ages nations which have discovered their vanities more then any thing that was seriously writ by which meanes many personages of eminent quality as well as those of low degree have come to the knowledge of the wickednesse of the Papall Hierarchy which had they beene seriously penned no man would have regarded yea the holy Prophets and divine Pen-men have made themselves merry with the vanity of the false Prophets and great men of their time many presidents of the which might be produced out of sacred writ so that there is no sinne in writing pleasantly against any such as goe about to seduce and mislead the people and alienate them from their duty towards God and their obedience to those that are in authority and from their duty and love to their brethren all which are capitall evils and which no true Saints will perpetrate Now I say in this that the Independents did so well like of my Letany and the merry passages in that booke and are so highly offended at my mirth in my just defence against them that are equally guilty with those they most mortally hate and in that they so harshly accuse those expressions in my booke which I have but borrowed from them saying that none that useth such can have a dramme of grace in them in all this they are very partiall and unjust Judges and give unrighteous judgement against their neighbour which is to doe evill to their neighbour which all true Saints will not doe and they may remember that the Lord in the 29. of of Isaiah condemned such as made a man an offender for a word But of all these things in their due place When I upon an other occasion shall answer to the moderate checks wherin I shall make it appeare had those expressions beene mine owne there had beene no blasphemy in them without it be esteemed blasphemy with them to compare a company of rude and rebellious wicked people to a good creature of God when as the Holy Ghost compareth such to a Dog returning to his vomit and to a Sow wallowing in the mire withall I shall then make it evident that the conspiracy of Corah Dathan and Abiram was not greater against Moses and Aaron then this confederacy of the Ill-dependents at that time against some of the honourable Members of the Parliament But letting passe their partiality in many other things towards their owne party in whom they can see no sinne I will goe on to the other characters of true Saints indeed as they are set downe by the Spirit of God the third of which in this verse is that they receive not a reproach against their neighbors The true Saints saith the Holy Ghost take not up a reproach against their neighbours they will neither heare much lesse entertain or receive an evill reproach or calumny against their neighbours for they have learned better things out of Gods holy word as in Exodus 23. verse 1. where the Lord speaking to his owne people and all true Saints saith Thou shalt not receive or rayse a false report put not thou thy hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witnesse Neither is there any thing more forbidden through the whole Scripture then whispering
and seduced and deceived such multitudes of simple people as they have done and that in a short time what multitudes of people may all men thinke those learned Rabbies those Priests with all the Apostles daily converted in Jerusalem when their doctrine was so crowned with so many miracles If the holy Scripture should never have delivered it unto the world that they converted innumerable companies yet common reason would perswade every man that they must needs have converted many thousands by the Ministry of them all but when the Scripture relateth unto us Matt. 3. and Marke the 1. and in many other places that all Ierusalem went out to the Baptisme of John and that they were baptized by him in Iordan and were made good Christians and when it farther also recordeth that there were three thousand converted at one Sermon and Miracle and saith in the same chapter that the Lord added daily unto the Church such as should be saved and when in the fourth chapter it relateth the conversion of five thousand men more and in the fifth chapter saith that more multitudes both of beleevers of men and women were added to the Lord and when in the sixth chapter it saith that the word of God increased and that the number of the Disciples multiplyed in Ierusalem greatly and a great company of the Priests were obedient to the faith all these places witnesse unto the world that they came into the Church in such great bodies as they could not now bee told for when they came in by by three thousand at a time and five thousand they could speedily be reckoned but when the increase grew so great they were forced then to set them downe as it were by whole sale not in enumerate parcels and spake of them as of numberlesse companies saying multitudes of beleevers both of men and women that is to say mighty congregations and great assemblies of both sexes in such abundance came in as they could not be told and as if this had not beene enough the holy Scripture speakes upon all occasions of the increase of the Word and sets downe in generall termes that the number of the Disciples multiplyed in Ierusalem greatly and a great company of the Priests were also obedient to the faith and as if this had not beene sufficient in many other places of the Acts there is mention made of the increase of Beleevers and in expresse words in the 21. of the Acts it is said that there were many ten thousands of Beleevers in the Church of Ierusalem now all men know that all these could not possibly no not a quarter of them meet in any one place or a few to communicate in all Ordinances to edification neither was there any place or roome spacious enough to containe the very bodies of the tenth part of them and if any place could have held the tenth part of them yet then it had beene impossible that they could then have partaken in all acts of worship to edification for they could not have heard the voice of their Ministers preaching unto them for by daily experience wee see it that in one of our Churches here in London which will not nor cannot hold halfe ten thousand that halfe of them ordinarily cannot well heare the voice of the Minister though hee have a strong paire of Lungs yea I heare men daily complaine that they could not understand the Minister preaching they stood so farre off from him when notwithstanding there were not three thousand then in the Church yea and I my self have been in lesse Assemblies where all the people could not heare to edification and therefore all reason will perswade any man that is not resolved ever to resist the truth that there must of necessity be many congregations of Beleevers in Ierusalem where there were such infinite multitudes especially they are bound to beleeve it when the Scripture in so many places as I have quoted saith there were many congregations and assemblies of Beleevers in that Church which I have at this time briefly related that if be possible I might at last satisfie Sir I. S. and perswade him to beleeve the Scripture and be satisfied with it if hee will not beleeve mee or be satisfied with any thing I can say to convince him of his error But if all I have hitherto writ will not satisfie his tender conscience and take his scruples out of his mind I shall now before I conclude this point for a Corallary desire him to heare what my brother Burton Saint Hanserdo two faithfull brethren of his society have writ concerning this busines It may be I. S. upon the testimony of two such approved witnesses and great Masters of the Assembly of the congregationall way will be perswaded that there were many Congregations of Beleevers in the Church of Ierusalem though he would not be satisfied with any thing I have delivered I cannot but often make mention of my brother Burton and Saint Hanserdo because all the Ill-dependents judge them to bee very honest men and suppose that they will speake the truth and I beleeve also that Sir I. S. hath a very venerable opinion of them both for their singular wisdome and erudition I intreat I. S. therefore in the first place to heare my brother Burton sapientum octavum it may be his words may satisfie his scrupulous and tender conscience who in the ninth page of his wise booke sayes that the beleevers in Ierusalem when there were but three thousand of them and five thousand at most were constrained to sever themselves into divers companies in severall private hou es to communicate Saint Hanserdoes words are these page 10. 11. The Apostles and all the Beleevers in Ierusalem met together in one place to wit the Temple and in Solomons Porch and brake bread from house to house Thus they both declare their faith and opinion cencerning the number and assemblies of Beleevers in the Church of Ierusalem and that in the infancy of it Now then when there were but about three thousand and six score soules at the first and five thousand in all at last according to the computation of my brother Burton and Saint Hanserdo they were then forced into many congregations and companies as having no convenient place spacious enough as wherein to break bread so that they were forced to heare the Word in the Temple that is one place and in Solomons Porch that is another place and to communicate in severall private houses according to my brother Burtons doctrin and to break bread from house to house or house by house and that dayly or day by day according to Saint Hanserdoes learning that is in innumerable places I say when by the testimony of these two Seraphicall Doctors it is evident that in the very infancy and childhood of that Church There were many Asse blies and Congregations and that in severall private houses or from house to house how many congregations and assemblies of beleevers
his Throne all such as these are I say make Christ a Pagent King and salute him with haile Master as the Jews did to usurpe some of their own rhetorick and learned elequence but indeed they disthrone him For what is it to disthrone a King if writing of Warning Peeces and Pamphlets against Kings service and Kings-honour be not And what I pray is it to disthrone a King if this be not to passe all acts of Government in the peoples name and to send out all their warrants and mandates in the peoples name and to command all their officers to manage all their imploiments in the peoples name never so much as mentioning or taking notice of the King in a publique act of Government Are not all these actions and passages to any rationall creature a sufficient demonstration that the King in that Kingdome is either absolutely disthroned or is but a King to them in ludibry as Christ was to the wicked Jews I am confident that all understanding men will so conclude Now when in all the new congregations those new gathered churches the Ildependents there have such amongst them that write books and that with their approbation against Iesu-Worship that is against the Worship of Iesus who is the eternall King of his Church and when every day in all their particular churches they exercise all the acts of Government in the name of their churches and not in Christs the Kings name and that against the command of Christ and his Apostles I affirm and by the grace of God I hope ever to make it good that all this is not onely a robbing Christ our Lord and King of his due honour but a blasphemous and more then a Papall usurpation and derogating from his Kingly dignity and royalty yea it is indeed a plain disthroning of Christ their King and thrusting him out of his place and putting themselves in it which whether or no it be not the highest point of contumacy rebellion and blasphemy I leave to the judgment of others as for my self I know not what either of these things be if they be not blasphemy for when I learned Divinity I was taught that blasphemy consisted in this either to give unto God that that belonged not to him and to the excellency of his Majesty divine nature or to detract from him that that peculiarly belonged either to the essence persons or glorious attributes of the diety or to give the honour properly and peculiarly due to God the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost or to any person in the glorious Trinity to any creature or malitiously or wickedly to speak evill of God his essence attributes word works c. or to do or act any thing obstinately and wilfully that is or may be derogatory to the dignity and honour of the Divine Majesty of God blessed for ever any of these things when I studied Divinity were thought blasphemy and worthy of severest punishments and those that perpetrated any of those crimes were reputed unworthy to live and proclamed blasphemers and men unsufferable and yet there are many such kind of creatures in our new gathered Churches who are guilty of all that can be called blasphemy and that rob Christ the Lord of his Worship and write against Iesu-worship blaspheme the holy Scriptures and deny the diety of Christ and the blessed Trinity c. and disthrone Christ in their new Congregations whiles they cry hail Master exercising all acts of Government amongst themselvs in the name of the Church never so much as mentioning the name of Christ the King and many more intolerable insolencies they dayly commit against the Soveraign Majesty of heaven and earth the Lord Jesus Christ our Lord and King and all these notwithstanding are counted Saints that commit these vices and malifices and great books are writ in defence of all these wicked blasphemous wretches and both their errors and their persons are countenanced and that by their great Rabbyes and Champions all which notwithstanding are in Gods dialect and in his holy Word both old and new counted abominable creatures and men unholy and displeasing unto God and the acters and abetters and countenancers of all such blasphemies and wickednesses were thought equally guilty and great and fearfull judgements were denounced against them all as it is apparently evident out of Gods holy Word and yet these great evills are counted but the infirmities of the Saints amongst our Independent masters Now then I say when the Illdefendents are guilty of all these crimes as partly acting them partly tolerating such as are both actors and abetters or conniving at them and countenancing them pretend they what they will of setting up Christ upon his Throne I hope to be ever able to make it good that they all of them disthrone Christ manifest to the world that as much as in them lies they would not have him raign over them and so make themselves guilty of that crime they lay to the Presbyterians charg whom they dayly accuse to be enemies of Jesus Christ his Kingdom and such as would not have Christ rule over them when notwithstanding the Presbyterians do and ever will by Gods divine assistance set up Christ King upon his Throne and shall ever desire that all honour and glory and praise may be given for ever and ever to the King eternall immortall invisible the only wise God the King of Saints and King of Kings and that he may solely rule for ever and that all his enemies and such as rob him of his honour and dignity may be made his footstoole in the number of which the greatest part of the Sectaries are and all such as comply with them And this shall suffice to have spoken concerning the first part of my undertaking against I. S. which was to set forth the wickednesse of the Independents and to shew how by their doctrine they rob Christ of his honour and Kingly dignity when they pretend they set him upon his Throne which is an unsufferable blasphemy in them And now I come to prove against I. S. that I undertook in the second place to make good viz. that by their doctrine they not only rob Christ of his honour but all Christs blessed Apostles Ministers and Servants of their power and leave them nothing but the name and shadow of authority which is a horrid injustice and wickednesse in the Sectaries and Independents to do which although I have briefly proved before yet I shall here again for the more full elucidation of the truth and for the better setting forth of the Ill-dependent wickednesse a little further expatiate in this business and answer to all that I. S. hath materially or with any colour to speak in behalfe of his cause where I presume he hath spake as much as he and his complices thought and conceived made for it and for which their vain and impious jangling they must one day give a dreadfull account I undertake therefore now to prove
that by this their doctrine they not onely rob Christ the King of his Church of his honour and dignity which I made good before but all the holy Apostles and Presbyters his Ministers and Servants also of their honour power and dignity which the King of his Church the Lord Jesus had invested them with and bestowed upon them all which will clearly appear if we shall again briefly consider and but take notice First what power and authority God gave unto his Apostles and to his Ministers which was the power of the Keyes Matth. 16. and Matth. 18. that is all power in his Church under him Matth. 28. and Mark 16. I say if we shall duly in the first place but consider that all the Apostles Christs speciall Ministers and Servants were by Christ himself invested with all authority and guided in their preaching and writing by his holy spirit so that whatsoever they taught or writ as his Ministers were the dictates of his spirit and the commandments of God and were for ever to be the rule of his Church to all succeeding ages to the end of the World and if we consider also what he promised to his blessed Apostles and all his Servants and Ministers that should succeed them viz. that he would be with them to the end of the World to all which Ministers likewise he had given the keys and made them stewards and overseers of his house which is his Church I say if we but duly weigh all these things we shall finde them all invested with plenary authority and by the very commission of God for ever inabled to exercise all acts of Government in the Church and that by themselves without the assistance and concurrence of the people who were never joyned with them in commission but received commands from heaven to obey those that God had made guides over them and made Rulers in his Church I say if we maturely consider all these immunities and priviledges and the power that the Apostles and Ministers of Christ were indued with and that from Christ the King of his church And on the other side shall but consider what learned I. S. in the name of all the Independents his brethren declareth concerning not onely all the ordinary Ministers of the church but what he delivereth concerning the blessed Apostles we shall clearly perceive that herobbs them all of that honour dignity and power which God hath given them and invests the people with it which is a double injustice First in taking from the Apostles and Ministers that which was their due and which God had bestowed upon them And secondly in giving unto the people that which pertained not to them and to which they had no right nor could lay no claime and with which they were not to meddle But take notice of his Doctrine what hee holds and beleeves concerning the ordinary Ministers page 12. In ordination saith hee election belongeth unto the brethren Jmposition of hands is proper to the Officers where there are Officers as in a Church constituted and compleate otherwise if the Church be not compleate according to his learning the people may doe it Thus I. S. speaks there and in the 11 page hee grants it is the Presbyters part to rule But as soone as hee hath spake the word as if hee repented of what he had said hee comes in with a but saying but wee distinguish betweene Authority and Iurisdiction on the one hand and Power and Jnterest on the other this latter belongs unto the people the other is proper unto the Officers which yet they exercise in the name of the Church The Officers saith hee ordaine they excommunicate they leade and direct in all government and disputes they have the executive power but the people have a power and interest too that is in his dialect as hee declared himselfe in the words going before the Officers must exercise all their authority and jurisdiction in the name of the Church and must doe as the people shall direct them for their power is onely the executive power they are onely the executioners of the church they can neither elect any officers nor excommunicate any without they have the leave and good liking from the people for the radicall and originall power lyes in the people and church which if it be not utterly to overthrow the authority of the Ministers and to make them nothing but cyphers in the Church and most sacrilegiously to rob them of that power Christ the King of his Church hath given them and to arrogate it and assume it unto themselves and whether this be not the greatest wickednesse and injustice in the Independents that can be committed against men I leave it to the consideration and judgement of all conscientious and learned men and whether such temerarious and bold impudent theives and Church-robbers ought not with greatest severity and justice to be proceeded against for this their malefice and unsufferable wickednesse who doe not onely take from the Ministers of Iesus Christ whom they ought ever to have in great reverence for their workes sake 1 Thess 5. that honour power and authority Christ hath given them but labour likewise now with all their might to take from them also that that God hath put into the hearts of men his servants to give them viz. their tythes and lively-hood and all that by which they should support themselves and their poore Families which is as intolerable an in justice and ingratitude both towards God and men as can by mortall creatures bee committed which wickednesse of the Independents and Sectaries if the Magistrates shall suffer to goe unpunished I most confidently beleeve that the Lord and King of his Church the Lord of heaven and earth will take the quarrell of his righteousservants into his hand and will poure downe his plagues both on them and all their complices and abettors And now I have made it evident how they rob all the ordinary Ministers and Presbyters of the Gospel of their due honour and power I will make it likewise appeare that the Apostles also are by their doctrine in the same predicament and that they deale no better with them whom they have robbed also and spoyled of their honour power and authority and count of them all no otherwise then of ordinary and common Ministers and but as of a company of Executioners for wee must take what I. S. speakes in this busines to be uttered in the name of all the Independents for hee is but their mouth and his booke came forth by the authority and approbation of them all and was esteemed of as a goodly peece and he highly honoured amongst them for it His words are these page 12. The Apostles and Elders saith he as a Committee first prepared the dispute as not counting it so safe perhaps to admit the weake to the same whiles it was intricate and then reported it and had their assistance and concurrence and the Letters of resolution
they would have done the like and that they were men worthy of death which made them I say as equally guilty as their wicked Iudges and Executioners as wee may see also in those that assented unto the High-Priests and to the Scribes and Pharisees in putting to death the Lord of Life they made themselves all guilty of his blood and by that meanes brought the curse of God upon them and their children by it to this day as well as the High-Priests themselves a fearefull sinne though the world take no notice of it and which all these Kingdomes have yet to repent of Saint Paul also makes himselfe as guilty of Stephens blood as they that stoned him saying When thy holy Martyr Stephen was stoned I stood by and assented unto it and held the garments of those that stoned him By which hee acknowledgeth himselfe equally guilty and so all those that assented to all the cruelty done to the people of God in these Kingdomes and were approvers of their tyrannie are as guilty as the actors of it for consenting unto any treason or conspiracy or with any malefactors and all their complices both by the Law of God nature and nations makes them all guilty before God and men and as liable to justice and punishment as those that acted in those malefices and therefore those that but assent unto a toleration of all Religions a sinne so highly displeasing unto God are as guilty as the Actors of it and if but consenting make them guilty how guilty are they then that use Arguments to bring in a toleration of all Religions and abuse the Scriptures to this end and plead for it and would have it established by a Law surely they are offenders against divine Majesty in an elevated nature and have a great deale to answer for it before God especially when they doe it in a most scurrilous and rayling manner by which they manifest to all the world that they are more verst and better acquainted with the doctrine of Billings-gate then with the language of Canaan But this may seeme a wonderfull thing to all judicious men that that people which within these six yeers were afraid of a Surplice and of the crosse in Baptisme and of any popish ceremony or of any of their vaine traditions and will-worship which was their honour then should now plead for the toleration of the body and soule of Popery and for all other both Iewish and heathenish Religions and all manner of sects so destructive to that Religion which the King of Saints and King of Kings and the onely King of his Church the Lord Iesus Christ himselfe hath taught us and to the peace and quietnesse of the Land this I say must needs seeme a monstrous thing to any moderate minded Christian Nay how unreasonably doe these men deale with their brethren they plead for a toleration of all Religions here in England and yet in New-England banish men into Ilands from amongst them for dissenting from them in their new modell of Church-government and for but dissenting from them in their opinions about Religion and hâ—re amongst us what impious and rayling bookes doe they make against the Ministers for endeavouring to establish that Religion and that Church-government that God himselfe in his holy Word hath set downe and what approbrious names doe they give the faithfull and painfull Preachers and Pastors of the Church of England calling them Baals Priests the profest enemies of Iesus Christ and his Kingdome the lims of Antichrist false Prophets the brood of Babylon terming some particular men of them Rabshekes others Bauds others Black mouths legall Preachers and stiling all of them the cursed enemies of Iesus Christ and thinke of them as men not worthy to live and in expresse words professe it and yet these men plead for a toleration of all Religions when both by their words and deeds they manifest if it were in their power the first worke they would doe should be to root us all out of the Kingdome so that all men may see they say one thing and mean another that they would tolerate all Religions but onely that which is the true Religion and so by that meanes have no Religion at all but one of their owne making which by their new lights they have of late found out which they call the straight way to Heaven and the onely way of setting up Christ upon his Throne which is nothing else to say the truth but to dis-throne him and set up themselves and their new modell for who doth not see how already they lord it over all good Christians not admitting them to the Sacraments but upon their owne termes nor suffering their children to be baptized amongst them nor so much as suffering any they call Presbyterians to preach in their new congregated Assemblies and if this be to give a toleration of any Religion but their owne let all the world judge but I say and will ever by Gods assistance be able to make it good in that they plead for a toleration of all Religions they are guilty of hainous and foule sinnes being complices as well as they that are Actors Now then when the Presbyters of the Church of England seeke and endeavour in all their proceedings to establish that Religion which Christ the King of his Church hath taught them and his blessed Apostles and labour to set up that Government that was ordained in all Churches to be perpetuated to the end of the world in their so doing they imitate all the Patriarchs Prophets and Apostles and in that they doe more advance Christs Kingdome than the Independents who under pretence of liberty of conscience would bring in a toleration of all Religions and confusion upon us all Surely if ever any Ministers deserved well from the people the Ministers of England now do who by all their endeavours shew that they seek to bring them to the knowledge of God and of his Sonne Jesus Christ and to the knowledge of themselves which is life eternall For what could men do more than that which they have done who have Petitioned the House of Lords and Commons now sitting in the great Councell of the Kingdome that they might be armed with authority from them in their severall charges to have the examination of such as shall be admitted to the Sacraments that they may be rightly informed in the knowledge of those holy Mysteries and that â—one that are either ignorant or scandalous in their lives may be suffered to communicate at the Lords Table by which their endeavour they shew the Christian care they have of their eternall welfare for which the people are ever bound unto them and by the which also they take away all scandall and occasion of offence to others which formerly pretended that the cause of their separating from our Congregations and Assemblies was in regard they could not communicate with doggs and swine and with the tag ragge and bobtaile of all the Malignants
for in such termes they usually expresse themselves Now when the occasion of this scandall and offence is taken away by the care of the Ministers and all Superstition and Popish Ceremonies and all will worship is also rooted out and when the Gospell is truly and faithfully by them preached both in season and out of season and the Name of God truly invocated and the Sacraments duly and rightly administred what just cause have the Independents now either of separation or of traducing either Ministers or people of being enemies of Christ and his Kingdome when by all their indeavours they onely seek the advancement of him and his Kingdome amongst them I have so good an opinion of all moderate minded Christians that when they shall seriously weigh and consider what I have here writ and truly and faithfully set down that those of them that have formerly been alienated from them will again being now undeceived return every one of them to their own Pastors by whose Ministry they have been converted and that all other understanding men will not only have more charitable thoughts both of the Ministers and Beleevers of the Church of England but will likewise look more narrowly into and examine more diligently all those new wayes and by finding them out to be indeed but new will seek for the old way and walk in it And truly it stands all men now in hand that desire the welfare of the whole Kingdome yea the safety tranquillity and felicity of three Kingdomes and the peace of them all and the quiet of the Church and the prosperity of Zion and indeed the peace of their own families and a good accord harmony love and unity amongst brethren to seek for the old way which hath the promise of peace which can never be preserved where differences and diversities of opinions with a toleration of all Religions are allowed of for they tend to nothing but dis-union and to a violation of all bonds of true and cordiall affection for they can never love such as they have a command to shun nor never really affect such mens companies and acquaintance whom they are ever jealous of that they will seduce their wives children and families therefore I say that all people may not onely seek for but finde that old way of peace shall ever be his prayer that wisheth that all men may be saved and come to the knowledge of the Truth AN APPENDIX In the which all the reproaches and truth-gainsaying calumnies so injuriously and causelesly cast upon me by my Brother BURTON my Quondam Fellow-sufferer are all wiped away with the spunge of Innocency in this my true Answer unto him In the which also all such passages as hee so exceedingly exaggerates and cryes out against in my Preface and Postscript are cleared from his clamorous surmises and my Integrity vindicated from all his traducing Inferences and forced Conclusions Brother Burton IN the beginning of your Epistle to the Reader say you This answer was long agoe so conceived in the wombe as the slow birth may seeme to have out-gone his due time Truly it had beene good for you and farre more for your honour and for the honour and glory of God and for the honour of your holy profession that the wombe of this your Booke had beene its grave for it hath not onely given great scandall to many but sadded the hearts of multitudes of Gods people that formerly truly loved and honoured you But men that make more haste then good speed have cause at leisure often to repent as you one day must doe for this untimely birth of your deformed and monstrous brat To the matters of Argument concerning your opinion in answer to my Booke I have in the foregoing Treatise made my Reply in this Appendix I am to make my just defence against some false accusations and soule aspersions with which you have bespatterd mee through your whole discourse but should I summe up all the revilings scornings vilifying unsufferable and unchristian language which those of your Fraternity after I had declared my selfe to be none of your party before any of my Books came forth did and still doe provoke and salute mee with even in the open streets to the shame of their profession yet in the 27. page of your Booke approved of they would rise to a volume But I have learned with the Apostle Paul to passe through honour and dishonour through evill report and good report as a Deceiver and yet true 2 Cor. 6. 8. being therefore nothing moved with their raylings I spread them before the Lord and for brevitie sake will not here repeate them I shall onely take a note of some passing by many of the unbrotherly reproaches false accusations and bitter invectives poured out from your selfe whose Schollers it may be thought the others are and I will unfaynedly answer you in the words of truth and sobernesse and in the spirit of meeknesse and love But first give mee leave to say that from you of all men I least expected much lesse deserved such hard speeches I having beene not only a sufferer with you which ingageth a personall respect but alwayes ready and forward in the worst and most dangerous times to appeare in your defence to my owne great detriment and dammage and as a faithfull friend have stucke close and been serviceable unto you since as can sufficiently be proved when your protestation protested was questioned all which challenged a Christian circumspection even in reproving of humane frailties Now things being thus betweene you and mee how exceedingly doth it aggravate your offence in scandalizing my name as you have done For mine owne part when out of zeale to Gods Glory and my servent desire of Syons peace I write against that new way you walke in and justly blamed in generall naming no man the unwarrantable writings and censures published and laid upon all who in their judgements dissent from Independents though truly Godly affirming that they are but converts in part that they are enemies to Christs Kingly office and set up Christ as a pageant King that they neither professe nor confesse Christ but with the Iewes say wee will not have this man to raigne over us observing also in the Frontispices of their Bookes writ in defence of Independent errors these words Thinke not that I am come to send peace upon earth I came not to send peace but a sword c. Matth. 10. 34 35 36. and that in a time of so great distractions when your party have subtilly spread Schisme Faction and caused fraction and division through the Kingdome and considering withall how ready tumultuous and turbulent people are especially upon such advantages as these to misapply Christs words as all men may see and by their daily expressions plainly perceive they doe and from that text are easily perswaded to beleeve they have good ground and warrant to fight against their Christian brethren to maintaine errors and their owne whimsies I
part of this last Querie is the same with the former for here you speake as if to slight the Independents were a sure way to obtaine favour and applause from Popish Cavaliers truly you flatter your selfe if you thinke your subtill dealing herein is not seene when as it is so notoriously known that any man who speaks against Independents may be scorned but never applauded by Popish or any that are Cavaliers for they applaud the Independents whom they hold to be more subtill and powerfull to effect the thing they chiefly ayms at and desire then themselves and it is well knowne and can be proved that they will run and goe to doe any Malignant a favour yea they will joyne with the wickedest Cavaliers against a Presbyterian to doe him a mischiefe But having cleared this truth in my Reply to your first Querie I hasten to the other part of this where you start the Question Whether the favour I received were not by my courtly compliance with Papists preferring them before Protestants c. To which I answer that my constant perseverance in holding forth the true Protestant Religion where ever I lived at home and beyond the seas is sufficiently knowne to all the godly faithfull orthodox Christians that inhabited in any of those parts where I have dwelt and so farre have I ever beene from any courtly complying with Papists or preferring them before Protestants as some in England at this day can testifie that when I lived in forraine nations my zeale was so great for the Protestant Religion that with no little hazard I have maintained it for all the while I travailed abroad and continued in Popish Countries which was many yeares it fared with mee as with the Apostle Paul while hee waited at Athens Act. 17. 16 17. my spirit was stirred in me when I saw the Cities and all the Countries wholly given to Idolatry therefore carrying my life in my hand I daily disputed with Papists and those they accounted the devout persons Priests and Iesuits against Popery maintaining the Protestant Religion insomuch as it was only the goodnesse of my God that kept me safe giving them no power to hurt mee further J answer you the Bookes that I have written against Popery in Latine and in English are yet extant and they doe witnesse and will to future generations that the Author of them disputed against and disclaimed Popery and earnestly contented for the faith which was once delivered unto the Saints Iud. vers 3. yea the many disputations I have held with Priests Jesuits and people popishly affected in England not onely while I injoyed my liberty but also when by the Prelaticall popish party J was for maintaining the true Protestant Religion and standing for the peace and welfare of my countrey cast into severall prisons viz. in the Gate-house at Westminster in the Castle of Launceston in Cornewall in the Castle in the Isle of Sylly in the Goale of Leicester in the Goale in the Citie of Yorke in Hemsley-Castle in Yorke-shire Lastly in Knasebrough-Castle in Yorke-shire Yet through Gods supporting grace in none of all these prisons could the cruelty pride and fury of men which in Yorke and Sylly was my daily portion either make me forget my integrity or daunt mee in the least for their rage and power I feared not neither did I ever forbeare to justifie godly Protestants nor decline any opportunity to dispute with Papists but improved it to the uttermost to shew the great idolatry and vanity of their Religion as many who were prisoners with mee in some of the fore-named places can testifie And I am confident that the Popish Cavaliers with whom I have beene a prisoner and others of them that have discoursed and reasoned with me in matters of Religion will give this testimony that they ever found me constant to my principles unmoveable in the Protestant Religion and as farre from complying with Papists or preferring them before Protestants what ever I suffered or under-went as light is from darkenesse in its greatest brightnesse Moreover Brother I would not that you should be ignorant how that I have beene as frequent in disputations writ as much in confutation and at all times and in all companies have appeared as forward and earnest against Papists and have ventured my life to maintaine the Protestant Religion as freely as any Independent I know in England and that in the worst of times yea when those who are now the chiefe independent Rabbies to avoyd suffering for truth would not stand to appeare in her behalfe but went out of the Kingdome and like the parents of the man that was borne blind Joh. 9. 21. Left her to speake for her selfe then J helped to maintaine truths cause and was not afraid nor ashamed to suffer in so good a quarrell but resisted her opposers Papists Prelates Arminians and Formalists in their erroneous Doctrines and Popish practises even unto blood I am become a foole in glorying you have compelled me 2 Cor. 12. 11. for so many reproaches which you have cast upon me and such groundlesse Queries could never have proceeded from any that had not beene guided should I say by a traducing spirit truly that word would come short fully to explaine and set forth the sinfull subtilty of them therefore I will not undertake to set down what spirit it was and what name it will beare I shall onely shew what it was not and leave it to such as are godly wife and experienced Christians to spell out the name thereof Now it is very evident that it was not the spirit of brotherly love that would have silenced yea annihilated such thoughts in the first conception for as brotherly love thinks no evill much lesse dares it devise and publish falshood yet more evill and greater falshood then you have not only thought as it plainely appeares but published against me and that deliberately none could ever have imagined for you render me a scandalous Walker as vile as vile can be and here you question whether I have not complyed with Papists and Popish Cavaliers and preferred them before Protestants Thus with your windie Independent policie you blast my good name raise doubts cloud my sincerity darken and overshadow my faithfull constant perseverance in the truth and wayes of God to make me be thought a man infamous and of no Religion but such dealings are absolutely contrary to brotherly love therefore it is very clear to the understanding of all that you were not guided by that spirit And as your quaeries were made without brotherly love so they seem to be altogether voyd of Christian experience being wholly filled with evill surmises scrued up to their height by the hand of carnall reason and uttered by the tongue of sinfull suspicion For I beseech you consider how it comes to passe that you who have been a Prisoner one of my Quondam Fellow Sufferers when you heare that I being a Prisoner under the command and power of