§. 8. alibi Vasquez d Examen praef monit R. Jac. p. 49 55 103 142 143. Coquaeus e Aphorism Confess in verb. Clericus princeps Tyrannus Emanuel Sa f De Haeres c. 30. p. 293 296. Santarellus g De Reg. Reg. instit l. 1. c. 6. p. 58 c. c. 7. p. 63 c. Mariana h Defens Bell. T. 2. col 1153 c. adv Reg. Brit. c. 6 7. def Apol. Gall. p. 591. Gretser i Tom. 3. disp 5. q. 8. punct 3. Valentia by Cardinal k Letter about Devent p. 27 28 30. in Resp pro Cathol adv persecut Angl. passim vid. c. 2 4 5. ext in concert Eccl. Cath. in Anglia Allen l Controv 3. q. 5. artic 2. p. 710 711. Stapleton m De Visib Monarch l. 2. c. 4. de clave David l. 1. c. 6. p. 26. c. 9. p. 57. l. 2. c. 10. p. 99. Saunders n Quiet sob reck p. 80. Letter of the Oath of Alleg. p. 18 19 80 85. Philopat sive ejus sit sive Creswelli p. 106 107. it §. 158 160 162 221. Parsons and hundreds more I shall a little more particularly instance in Bellarmin because he is the most profest Champion of the Papal cause and being a man of great wit and Learning express'd himself as cautiously as he well could in this matter yea so cautiously that Pope Sixtus V. was once resolv'd to have condemn'd and supprest his writings because attributing too little to the Papal authority as the Cardinals themselves told mine Author o Gu. Barcl de potest Papae edit 1609. c. 13. p. 101. c. 40. p. 329. and yet even he p De Rom. Pontif. l. 5. c. 6. col 889. c. 7. ib. c. sayes roundly that the political Power not only as 't is Christian but as 't is Civil is subject to the Ecclesiastical so that the Pope may in order to the good of souls govern and dispose of temporal Princes alter Kingdoms take them away from one and give them to another that if a King be an Infidel or an Heretic and we know what they mean by that nay he particularly reckons the Kings of England among his instances and seek to draw his Dominions to his sect it is not only lawful but a duty in his subjects to deprive him of his Kingdom And whereas sayes he the primitive Christians attempted not the like on Nero Dioclesian Julian or the rest it was not it seems that they boggled out of a sense of duty but only quia deerant vires temporales because they wanted means and power to effect it A bold piece of falshood Fuligat vit Bell. l. 1. c. 2. p. 17. and a sufficient confutation of what the Writer of his Life affirms that he could not remember that he had ever told a lye in his life or disguised the truth by fraud or sophistry If it be here said as sometimes they do when pincht with these objections that these are but the opinions of their private Doctors and not the public and standing declarations of that Church to this I shall briefly return these three things by way of answer 1. That this is a most gross and senseless evading of the argument for whether their Church publicly declare this or not 't is these private Doctors that steer mens Consciences conduct their practice and that diffuse the venom into all parts of the Christian world and if the mischief be done by vertue of these hellish Principles Princes murdered Kingdoms invaded and the foundations of Government overturned 't is little matter whether it be done by connivence or command as if the family be destroyed by the servants scattering of poyson in every corner 't is but a trifling excuse that the Master of the house did not command but only stand by and see them do it 2. These pernicious doctrines are publicly taught in their Schools and Universities and Books of them printed in all Countries approv'd licenc't and recommended and suffered to pass without controul the very worst of them never censur'd condemn'd or burnt by the supream authority of that Church which in all reason justice and equity they were oblig'd to do did they not allow and own them 3. And which will fully answer this matter Most of these detestable principles are extant in the body of their Canon Law See the Bishop of Lincoln's Book called Principles and positions approved by the Church of Rome which is their public rule and standard at this day are determined in the Breves and Bulls of their several Popes who have solemnly denounc't those things ex Cathedra and what 's higher yet are in effect found in the Decrees of their own General Councils I instance in two Ann. 1215. the Council of Lateran whereat were present the Pope the Patriarchs of Constantinople and Jerusalem seventy Arch-bishops four hundred and twelve Bishops eight hundred Abbots and Priors besides Embassadors from most Princes in Christendom this Council decreed that Heretical Lords and Rulers should be Excommunicated their Vassals absolved from their obedience their Lands seiz'd and dispos'd of to Catholics In the general Council at Lyons Ann. 1245. the Pope by advice of the Cardinals and Council and by a definitive sentence pronounc't there depos'd and depriv'd the Emperour Frederic discharg'd his sworn Subjects from their Allegiance Excommunicating all such as should obey or favour him commanding the Princes forthwith to proceed to a new Election all which is inserted into the Acts of that Council To be short so evident is the case that some of their greatest Champions more candid and ingenuous than the rest have plainly confest that if the Pope have not such a power of Excommunicating and deposing Princes and absolving Subjects from their Fealty and Allegiance See Card. Perrons Harangue among his Works in French p. 635. Lessius seu Gu. Singletonus Discuss Decret Conc. Later p. 46 90 100 123. but especially the Jesuits Loyalty printed 1677. the first Treatise their Church having all along challeng'd and exercis'd it in her supremest Tribunals must be fallen into a damnable errour both in faith and practice and consequently must cease to be a true Church that therefore the belief of it is an article essential to it and to assert the contrary is an opinion erroneous in faith temerarious and impious But if their Church must needs stand or fall with this principle let them look to that 't is in the mean time evident enough that the principles they believe and teach are in the tendency of them immediately destructive of the safety and authority of Princes and the peace of humane society But alas that 's not all nor the worst of the case These pernicious doctrines are not meer Scholastic subtleties dry and barren speculations but impregnated with life and power and accordingly II. The practices of the men of that Church have been alwayes
agreeable to their principles And for the truth of this I might appeal to the Records of all Nations in Christendom those volumes and Martyrologies which the iniquity of these mens principles have filled with tragical and lamentable stories What miserable havoc have they made in Germany where to pass by other things the Emperour Henry the Fourth was so persecuted by Pope Hildebrand and his Successor with Curses Deprivations Armies and Rebellions that he was even wearied out of his life forc't at last to resign the Empire and tho in vain upon his knees to beg Absolution from the Popes Legat and peace from his own Son whom they had raised up against him The same and worse they did by Frederic Barbarossa by Otho the Fourth by Frederic the Second and by Henry the Seventh who marching with an Army into Italy to recover the Rights of the Empire is very credibly reported p Sabell Ennead ix l. 8. p. 794. Plat. in Clem. v. p. 252. Naucler Chron. Gen. xliv p. 372. Volater l. 23. p. 879. Genebr Chron. l. 4. Ann. 1305. p. 677. to have been poyson'd with the Sacrament Nor did the Emperours enjoy any tolerable quiet from Rome till Charles the Fifth heartily espous'd the Papal interest ever since whose time the Emperours have been almost intirely swayed by the Councils of the Jesuits An order of men born for the destruction of mankind whom therefore the wise State of Venice banisht out of all their Dominions Histor Interdict Venet l. 3. p. 71. Eng. Edit p. 138. professing they did it for this reason because they had been the authors and instruments of all uproars seditions confusions and ruines that had hapned in those times in all the Kingdoms and States of the Christian world To which let me add what their Martyr Campian who was hang'd at Tyburn expresly tells us Epist ad Concil Reg. Angl. x. ejus Rat. praefix in Concert Cath. alib that all the Jesuits in the world have long since entred into Covenant never to cease their attempts upon us which they despair not to take effect so long as any one Jesuite remains in the world In France the poyson of these principles has wrought no less vigorously and effectually Pope Zachary depos'd Childeric III. who was thereupon thrust into a Monastery and the Pope bestowed the Crown upon Pipin the Major-domo of his Palace Lewis VII was interdicted and forc't to submit Philip the Fourth so vext with the oppositions of Pope Boniface the Eighth that for three years together he scarce had one quiet hour After the Reformation the Zeal of Popery grew more fierce and bloody In the Parisian Massacre were slain there and in other parts of France to the number of above thirty thousand Protestants The news whereof arriving at Rome Thuan. lib. 53. ad Ann. 1572. Tom. 11. p. 837. the Pope presently convened the Cardinals and went in a solemn procession to S. Mark 's Church there to give public thanks to God for so great a blessing conferr'd upon the See of Rome and the Christian world and resolved for this reason chiefly that the year of Jubilee should be immediately proclaimed that all Christendom might rejoice for so great a slaughter of heretics and the whole solemnity was concluded with shooting off the Great Guns Bonefires and all other expressions of the greatest triumph and rejoycing What miserable ruins slaughters and devastations were made by the confederates of the Holy League for many years together And in the midst of all Henry the Third a Prince of their own Communion stab'd by Jaques Clement a Dominican Frier encouraged thereunto by the Sermons of the Jesuits and particularly by his Father Confessour who promised him a Crown of Martyrdom if he died in the attempt but if he survived that he should be made a Bishop or a Cardinal Boucherius de fusta Abdicatione Henrici III. edit Lugd. An. 1591. Franc. Veron Apol. pour Jehan Chastel aliique vid. Thuan ad An. 1589. T. 4. p. 460. An. 1594. T. 5. p. 519. Ann. 1604. p. 1124. And the fact magnified as noble and heroick justified in Printed Apologies and Books written on purpose to prove that 't is lawful so a private man to kill a Tyrant though there be neither sentence of the Church nor Kingdom pronounc't against him Orat. Sixti V. habita Sept. 11. 1589. printed first at Rome then at Paris An. 1589. by Authority of the Holy Union and approbation of three Sorbon Doctors and since oft Reprinted vid. Thuan ib. An. 1589. Nay 't was approv'd and applauded by Pope Sixtus V. in an Oration made on purpose in the Consistory wherein he compares it to and prefers it before that of Judith's killing Holofernes and more than once and again affirms that that great and miraculous work was to be ascrib'd only to the particular Providence of God without whose especial aid he sayes it could not have been brought to pass The like unhappy fate overtook his Successour the great King Henry the Fourth whom Ravaillac who had sometimes been a Monk stab'd in his Coach with a poysoned knife and at his Examination boldly confess'd he did it because the King did not take Arms against the Hugonots and that his making War against the Pope is the same as to make War against God Seeing the Pope was God and God was the Pope 'T were endless to pursue the stories of Forraign Nations and happy had it been for us had they kept there But tho nature seems to have secur'd us pretty well against external invasions yet these restless and daring men after all the villanies they have done in other Countreys have put their hellish designs aboard and are come hither also I pass over their infinite Treasons Disturbances and Rebellions precedent to the Reformation No sooner had Henry the Eighth thrown off the Romish Yoke but a Bull of Excommunication was thundred out against him and that followed by no less than three Rebellions at home contrived and carried on by the counsels and artifice of the Popish Clergy and little less there were in the short Reign of his Successor In the long and happy Reign of Queen Elizabeth Vid. Cambden Annal. Elizab. ad Ann. 1569 1570 79 80 83 84 85 86 87 88 94 98. Bishop Carleton's Thankful Remembrance of God's mercies per tot Foulis Popish Treasons c. l. 7. c. 3 4 c. few years pass'd over her head without some considerable attempt either against her life or Government Ann. 1569. came out Pius V. his Bull of deprivation against her whereupon succeeded two Rebellions in the North the chief whereof was headed by the Earls of Westmorland and Northumberland The next year Stuckley by the help of the Pope and Spaniard invaded Ireland where Saunders the Jesuit the firebrand of that Rebellion for want of success fell mad and died This was not well over when Campian and Parsons came hither the two first Jesuits would God they
had been the last that ever arriv'd in England who set themselves to blow up the Nation into an open flame Two years after Somervile inflam'd by the Writings of the Jesuits crowded with a drawn Sword into the Queens presence and having set upon one or two that stood in his way confest 't was his intent to have murdered the Queen and for fear of telling more tales was three dayes after found strangled in prison About the same time Throgmorton and some others conspired against her with design to set up the Queen of Scots Ann. 1585. William Parry Doctor of Law set on by the Jesuits the Popes Nuncio and by the Pope himself undertook to kill the Queen but his heart failing in the attempt he was taken and Executed The year after Babington and his accomplices held a consult at S. Giles in the Fields to murder the Queen and invade the Realm for which seven of them were hang'd and the like plotted by Stafford and others the following year In eighty eight was the famous but unsuccessful Invasion of the Invincible Armado In ninety three Dr. Lopez a Portuguez the Queen's Physitian was hired for fifty thousand Crowns to poyson her which he confest afterwards In ninety six Edw. Squire being instructed in Spain by Walpool the Jesuit and by him furnisht with poyson prepared on purpose undertook to poyson the Queen's Saddle which he did tho through the goodness of the Divine Providence it took no effect King James succeeded to the Crown and as an entail to that to the hatred and malice of the Popish party To prepare the way Parsons the Jesuite writes a Book of the Succession to prove that he had no just title to the Crown and Garnet another of that Order procur'd two several Breves from Rome to exclude him See Sr. Edw. Cook 's Speech at Garnet's trial Relat. of the Gunpowd Treason p. 159. and Garnet's Confess at his Execut. p. 226. or any of the next line unless they were Roman Catholics Watson and Clark two Secular Priests drew several of the Nobility and Gentry into a Combination which they seal'd with an Oath of Secrecy to surprize the King and the Prince and to force from him a toleration of their Religion for which they were Executed And now utterly despairing of any favour from that wise and learned Prince these malignant and devilish Papists An. 3 Jac. R. c. 1. Jesuites and Seminary Priests as they are call'd in the very words of the Act of Parliament for the observation of this day entred into a black and unparallel'd conspiracy the Powder-Treason the deliverance from which we solemnly celebrate at this time wherein fire and darkness were summon'd up from hell to minister to the Execution and no less than King and Kingdom Religion and Liberty Estates and Lives design'd at once as a Burnt-sacrifice to their rage and fury Psal 2.4 But he that sits in heaven did laugh the Lord had them in derision over-rul'd the Plots and disappointed the devices of the crafty Job 5.12 so that their hands could not perform their enterprize In the Reign of King Charles I. they still carried on the same design and after all a Jesuitical Plot was set on foot discovered by means of Andreas ab Habernfield to murder the Arch-bishop Printed in Pryn's Romes Master piece An. 1643. and take away the King's Life Their bloody and inhumane butcheries in Ireland wherein above 100000 Protestants were barbarously murdered in cool blood are known to all What hand they had in the troubles of this and the neighbour Nation how they voted at their consults See Dr. Pet. du Moulins Vindicat. of the Protest Relig. ch 2. p. 58. and his Reply to a Person of honour p. 4 5 c. and the truth of the charge more particularly cleared in some paper which I have read of Dr. Bargrave late Prebend of Canterbury 't was for the interest of the Catholick Cause that the King should dye how active and instrumental they were to promote the Councils that took away the life of that excellent Prince the world is not now to learn And have they dealt better with us in the Reign of his Successour the King that now is To omit all other tastes they have given us of their good will their horrid conspiracy at this day whereat we all stand amaz'd and tremble contriv'd and carried on with so inhumane and barbarous a design is a sufficient evidence A Plot tho later in time not inferiour in malignity to any of the rest and so much the worse because done against all the laws of kindness and gratitude at a time when the public rods and axes were laid asleep and they liv'd secure and undisturb'd under the merciful connivance of the Government And tell me now after all this whether disloyalty and Treason blood and villany be not in a manner incorporated into the present polity and constitution of the See of Rome and as Historians say of old Rome that the foundations of it were laid in blood so whether Rome at this day be not built up cemented and supported by the same bloody arts and methods A constitution that with Saul pursues its enemies to rage and madness and breaths out nothing but threatning and slaughter against any that oppose it 'T was the happy character of the Christian Religion that of old dropt from the pen of an Heathen nil nisi justum suadet lene Am. Marcellin l. 22. p. 1626. that it commands nothing but what 's just mild and gentle whereas now were an unbiast Pagan to take the measures of Christianity from what is ordinarily allowed and practis'd in the Roman Church he would undoubtedly proscribe it not only as a scene of childish Pageantry but as a piece of the most exquisite savageness and barbarity In short they are a race of men who as our Church truly sayes in the Collect for this day turn Religion into Rebellion and faith into faction and who have manag'd the cause of the best Religion in the world with the utmost advantages both of scandal to Christianity and of mischief to the world I could not pardon my self if upon so fair an occasion I should not make this further inference that if Popery be so foul and odious a charge we would be very cautious upon whom we fasten that detestable character of Papists or Popishly-affected lest we would the righteous with the wicked and abuse innocent and undeserving men for no other reason perhaps than because in some few little things they are not of our mind Were Cramner and Ridley were Hooper and Latimer were these men Papists if not I beseech you let not any be traduc't under that odious name that act by the same principles and are ready to suffer for the same cause that they did 'T is time to lay aside our feuds and quarrels and unanimously to set our selves against the common enemy when Hannibal ad portas there 's an Enemy at the Gates that seeks to do his work with our hands and would then rejoice in the ruine of us both Let us heartily join in a grateful commemoration of this dayes deliverance and pay our utmost thanks to heaven for a mercy that preserv'd us a free and unenslaved Nation and which is more preserved the Gospel to us which is the glory of a Nation Consider with what subtlety and arts of secrecy this work of darkness was carried on 't was a mystery of iniquity to unravel the labyrinths whereof were a task fitter for a Secretary of the Prince of darkness Nothing of malice or mischief appear'd above ground no demonstrations of turbulency or discontent but all went mask'd under a smooth brow M. Sen. Controv. 22. lib. 3. p. 218. that as he in Seneca non ante intellexit proditionem quà m proditus sit he was in a manner betray'd before he understood the Treason so here the design was to take effect in a way wherein human force and policy should be too late to make resistance and they who acted it should only stand behind the Curtain this being part of that very Letter which through the providence of God proved the means of its discovery that tho there should be no appearance of any stir yet they should receive a terrible blow and none see who hurt them Lastly Consider the infinite horrour and villany of the design a design that struck at the very vitals of the Kingdom the liberty of the people the glory and purity of Religion the life honour and happiness of King Prince Peers and the representative commonalty of the Nation all at once This was no petty wickedness 't was a monster of Conspiracy as the great Thuanus ingenuously confesses whereto no age or Nation ever brought forth a parallel Ad Ann. 1606. lib. 135. T. 5. p. 1215. Nothing would serve their turns unless Kings and Princes whose lives have been alwayes even by the most barbarous Nations held Sacred and Venerable and the whole beauty and glory of such a flourishing Church and Nation at once fell before them and that too by the most merciless and raging Element and with such unheard of circumstances of inhumanity that nothing but the wit of hell could have found them out Cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel may God for ever divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel may that Almighty wisdom power and goodness that has hitherto superintended the happiness and security of this Nation evermore blast and thunder-strike their plots and projects and turn the Counsels of all such Achitophels into foolishness that all men may fear Psalm 64.9 10. and declare the work of God and wisely consider of his doing that the righteous may be glad in the Lord and trust in him and all the upright in heart may glory while the Lord is known by the judgement which he executeth Psal 9.16 and the wicked is snared in the work of his own hands Which God of his infinite mercy grant for Christ Jesus sake Amen FINIS