which he now seeks protection and which he acknowledges now at last being convinc'd thereof by the Events of Providence to have the Authority of God though introduced by the Devil But how does it follow that this Doctrine of his must therefore be received as the Doctrine of the Church of England because he finds it in Bishop Overal 's Book Do the Canons of a Convocation neither assented to by Act of Parliament nor so much as by the King 's Letters-Patents make or authoritatively declare the Doctrine of the Church of England Is the Convocation the Representative Body of the Church of England I know they tell us so in the Canons of 1603. But I never found that any but some few of the Clergy believed them Has what he calls the Church a power to determine matters of Civil Right Are we to go to School to Clergy-men to learn the Terms and Measures of our Duty and Allegiance to Magistrates which all Mankind but a few of that profession in our own Nation acknowledge to depend upon Human Laws and the several Constitutions of Government and which the body of our Clergy are so ignorant of that they are a dark Labyrinth to them When the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch And yet his Argument Page 9 10 drawn from the pretended Canons of that Convocation are as good Authority as can be urged to the Members of the Church of England for if a Convocation cannot declare the Judgement of the Church of England he knows not where we shall learn it So that the Members of the Church of England are to be guided in matters relating to their Temporal Rights by an Assembly of their Clergy Though even our Popish Ancestors protested from time to time against the Authority of the See of Rome in Temporalibus But I can tell him whence and whence only he may learn the Doctrine and Judgment of the Church of England authoritatively viz. in the Articles and the Liturgy which have the publick Sanction of the Legislative Authority not in his Spurious Canons of 1610 nor in those of 1640 nor yet in the Homilies though appointed by Act of Parliment to be read in Churches for so is the Apocrypha and yet we do not submit to those Books as Authoritative All other writings are but the Opinions of private Men The rest of that Section consists of some Stories of Jehu Ahab and Jezebel The Moabites and Aramites Ehud and Eglon the Kings of Egypt and Babylon the Four Monarchs Alexander Darius Jaddus and Caesar All which are no more to us than if he had told us a tale of Tom Thumb or Guy of Warwick But it is no new thing for the Clergy to top Foreign Laws and Governments upon us One of their Canons in 1603. is Quicunque in posterum assirmabit Potestatem Regiam non habere eandem Authoritatem in Causis Ecclesiasticis quam Pii Principes apud Judeos Christiani Imperatores in Primitiva Ecclesiâ obtinuerunt c. Excommunicetur ipso facto c. Our King's Jurisdiction in matters Ecclesiastical is setled and bounded by Laws of this Realm and those Laws we look upon as the measure of their Authority But Clergy men make nothing of Human Laws at least not of the Laws of England But send us to the Jews and to the Romans to enquire what Authority their Princes had and very boldly determine under the penalty of Excommunication That Our Kings have eandem potestatem And yet they neither know what power our Laws allow to our Kings nor what their Laws allow'd to theirs He grants that Kings set up by God have God's Authority and that all Kings who are in the actual possession of the Government are set up by God And therefore having God's Authority Allegiance is due to them So that he resolves the Duty of Allegiance into the Authority committed by God to the Prince the committing of which Authority appears by the Events of Providence For Providence is God's Government of the World by an invisible Influence and Power the Ends of which he serves by overruling mens wicked Designs to accomplish his own Counsels and decrees and either disappoints what they intended or gives success to them when he can serve the Ends of his Providence by their wickedness But how shall Subjects judge when God serves the ends of his Providence by man's wickedness and consequently when their obedience becomes due to a new Prince why obedience is due to God's authority when we can reasonably conclude that God has made him King p. 16. That is when the providence of God has settled him in the Throne But there are different degrees of settlement which require different degrees of submission The Doctor has gone hand in hand with providence ever since the Revolution p. 17. The generality of the Nation submitted to the present King and Queen and placed them on the Throne and put the whole power of the Kingdom into their hands though it may be the Doctor could not think them settled by Provedence whilest the late King had such a formidable power as made the Event p. 17. doubtful yet because he thought fit to continue in the Kingdom he could live quietly and peaceably pay taxes give them the title of King and Queen and pray for them as such because we are bound to pray for all that are in authority and that their Majesties had because they had power to do a great deal of good or a great deal of hurt Here power to do good or harm is authority And Thieves and Robbers have that But it may be the King and Queen had Gods authority all this while before the Doctor thought fit to own it by swearing Allegiance to them because he did not know they had it till the power of the dipossessed Prince was broken and no visible prospect of his recovering his Throne again So that men of the Doctor 's opinion must watch till God has play'd his game out before they can be ascertain'd what his will and pleasure is in these matters of obedience and swearing Allegiance to Princes For the will of God when known is the rule of Conscience But the will of God in these cases is no otherwise to be known but by the Events of Providence So that men of such Principles as this Gentleman represents to us for Church of England Principles must stay till the Storm be over and then they 'l tell us 't is fair weather I cannot sufficiently express my indignation against men that can have the confidence to represent the Church of England which is the body of the People of England and who have a right to their Properties and Religion as far as these words Right to Properties and Religion can be extended as a sort of men who must not stir their finger in opposition to a Prince that invades this Right all at once upon a supposition that the Prince is invested with God's
REMARKS UPON Dr. SHERLOCK'S BOOK Intituled The CASE OF THE ALLEGIANCE DUE TO SOVERAIGN PRINCES Stated and Resolved c. The Second Edition Printed at London and Re-printed in Edinburgh Anno Dom. 1691. REMARKS UPON D R. SHERLOCK'S CASE of ALLEGIANCE c. HAVING lately Perused Dr. Sherlock's Reasons as the Books is commonly called I cannot forbear imparting to you some very few Observations upon them not to Pref. p. 3. shew my Skill but to perform my Promise I observe in the First place That the Doctor thinks it necessary to convince all sober Christians That men may pref p. 4. swear Allegiance to King William and Queen Mary without renouncing any Principles of the Church of England But I hope we were not in such a condition as that All Sober Christians stood in need of such a Conviction And God forbid the Principles of the Church of England should be such as not only to create in all sober Christians a doubt whether they might swear Allegiance to the Present King and Queen but should be so obscure in the matter as that so Learned a Man the Doctor is reputed and so Wise a Man as he would be thought for he never gave any just occasion to the world to mark him out for a fool should be at almost Two Years Pains to make a Reconciliation betwixt Them and the Duty of Swearing Allegiance Pref. p. 1. to this present Government upon the continuance of which the Doctor does more than once or twice acknowledge the Liberties and Religion of the Nation to depend He confesses he stuck and should have stuck to this day had he not been relieved by Bishop Overal's convocation-Convocation-Book and had the Venerable Authority Pref. p. 5. of a Convocation given him greater Freedom and Liberty of Thinking which the apprehensions of Novelty and Singularity had cramp'd before How mean are we Laymen in the eyes of these Gentlemen Nothing that was done said or writ at and after the Revolution to justifie the Lawfulness thereof by the Laws of God and of this Realm had any influence upon this Clergy man's Judgment or Conscience till he met with a new upstart Convocation-Book Nay his very Thoughts were in Chains till the Veneable Authority of a Convocation gave him Liberty to Think What the Lords and Commons did the Consent of a Nation the Approbation of all Protestants abroad the Interest of Religion and the Publick Weal were not considerable enough to give this man a liberty to think his liberty of Thinking was cramp'd till the Venerable Authority of a Convocation came and set him at liberty I wonder the less to find him in his Book enslaving his Life and Liberty to what in a mistaken Notion he calls God's Authority since I perceive his very Thoughts are slaves to an Assembly of Ecclesiastiks He waves the matter of Right is not concerned in the Legality of the late Revolution * But I hope all Subjects that believe it may and ought to assert it And upon occasion would if they did believe it else they lye on the lurch to dispute she Right of Princes is a thing which no Government can permit to be a question amongst their Subjects such Disputes are needless in this Cause and serve only to confound it by carrying men into such dark Labyrinths of Law and History c. as very few know how to find their way out again To judge truly of the legality of the late Revolution requires such a perfect skill in Law and History and the Constitution of the English Government that few men are capable of making so plain and certain a judgment of it as to be a clear and safe Rule of Conscience Laymen think Laws and Constitutions of Governments to be safe Rules of Conscience in these Cases and no such dark Labyrinths as the Mysteries of the Holy Trinity and Incarnation the Satisfaction of our Saviour the Judge of Controversies c. which yet are all as plain to the Doctor as a Pike-staff the Scripture and Reason are admirably clear in all these things but the Laws of a Nation and the Constitution of its Government are a dark Labyrinth None are so blind as they that will not see Till some Proud Ambitious Clergy-men and Flattering Courtiers either really or pretendedly ignorant of our Laws and Constitutions set their own and other Mercenary Heads and Pens at work to represent our Government in quite other than its own native Colours out of a base Compliance with a Court that left no stone unturn'd to overthrow it till then I say the Constitution of our Government was so well understood by our Fore-fathers that they supported and asserted it from time to time at a vast Expence of Blood and Treasure and transmitted it down to their Posterity as they had received it from their Ancestors confirmed with all the Sanctions that the nature of the thing was capable of nor were ever beholden to a Foreign Prince to preserve it till now nor needed to have had recourse to the Prince of Orange to assert their Liberties if the overflowing of such Bigottry as this Gentleman is infected with had not almost unmann'd the Nation and prepar'd them for Slavery And two ways were taken to effect it the one by perswading us That we are Slaves by the Law of God and the other by representing our Government as being absolute in its Original Constitution and that whatever Liberties the People claim a Right to are either Concessions from the Crown or Usurpations upon it And because some ignorant People have been imposed upon by the misapplication of Scripture by the Clergy and by mis-understanding and mis-applying our Ancient Histories and Records and not thoroughly searching them neither our Constitution and Fundamental Laws must now be represented as not clear nor a safe Rule for Conscience and therefore another must be set up in stead of them invented by a Clergy-man in his Study directed in his Enquiry by a few of his own Profession either ignorant of our Constitution or prosessed Enemies to it or both and this Rule of Conscience not so clear neither but that our Spiritual Guides are together by the ears about it and the Learned Dr. Sherlock has been all this while finding it out But found it he has The Mountains have been in Labour and behold the Mouse God when he sees fit and can better serve the Ends of his Providence by pag. 2. 3. it sets up Kings without any regard to Legal Right or Human Laws Kings thus set up by God are invested with God's Authority Subjects are bound to Obey and to Pay and Swear Allegiance if it be required to those Princes whom God hath placed and settled in the Throne when they are invested with God Authority This is no new Invention of the Doctor 's nor does he pretend to it he had it it seems from Bishop Overal's Convocation-Book But Sir Robert Filmer broached it before that Book came out
Authority as if a man could act by God's Authority in opposition to the Laws of the Realm and his own Oath to observe them and cause them to be duly executed as if Princes had any other Authority from God then to govern according to Law as if resisting a Lawless Authority which is no Authority were resisting the Authority of God as a sort of men to whom the Laws and Religion of the Nation upon which all that can be dean to us depends must never owe any thing for their preservation tho' in the greatest extremities so long as they are guided by the spirit of their Church◠tho' thanks be to Heavens a late Divine has furnished us with a distinction betwixt that and the spirit of God No they must be quiet and suffer all to be trampled undersoot by God's Authority unless wicked-men form designs against God's Dr. Hickman Authority to preserve the Authority of the Laws and the Profession of God's true Religion So that the best things that can be done in the World must be done by wicked men and in opposition to God's Authority or not be done at all And all this while that the Church mast sit still the Providence of God is at work by means of the Devil and his Agents wicked men against his own Authority which a King that has a legal title but exercises an illegal power is invested with and herein consists the unsearchable Wisdom of Providence that God serves his own Ends by their Wickedness It seems he can never serve his Ends by the Godliness of the Church but must carry on Ends for their good by the free Ministeries of wicked men All you Patriots that with the hazard of your Lives and Estates stept into the gap to prevent Popery and Slavery coming in like a torrent upon Church and State and who in so doing thought you did God good Service because your End was the preservation of your own and your Countries Liberties Properties and Religion under a legal administration of the ancient English Government were all that while sighting against God you were resisting the power ordain'd by God and so doing you receiv'd to your selves damnation and tho' God has wrought a deliverance through your wickedness no thanks to you tho' the Nation has consented to what you have done by as universal a consent as perhaps was ever heard of this National consent is but an indication that God has given the King and Queen his Authority but does not invest them with any legal Right that remains in the dispossessed King yet So that you and the Nation have but been endeavouring to transfer what it is not in your power to transfer viz. a legal Right And you have transferred what you never intended to transfer nor ever acknowledged viz. an irresistible Authority from God Dr. Sherlock has found out now what you were then doing and sees the consequence of your Actions to your selves and all men else unknown You aided the Prince and promoted the Ends of his Declaration which were to deliver the Nation from Popery and Slavery so as it might never be in the power of any Prince hereafter to introduce either but Dr. Sherlock tells ye that can never be done for it never will be Lawful nor indeed possible to exclude Slavery Because every Prince has God's authority which is irresistible and I 'm sure he that is your Prince and is by the Law of God irresistible to him you are slaves by the Law of God So that you have but changed Masters according to his principle one of a rough temper for a more mild one And all your security depends upon the good nature of your Prince for the time being I neither have leasure nor if I had that can I have patience nor if I had both can I think it worth my while to run through the Book and animadvert upon it Paragraph by Paragraph For if it were much better written then it is yet the writing of him who slights and despises to that degree that he does upon all occasions every man's reason but his own and in this Discourse sets up an Hypothesis of his own for a Rule to men's Consciences in matters of Government without any regard to the Laws of the Nation can hardly deserve so much regard as a serious answer would require He tells us that an Oath to a dispossessed Prince ceases Gessante materiâ for though the man be still in being the King is gone So that the Kingly authority p. 16. may be transferr'd from one person to another But then they that assist and defend the new Prince in opposition to the title of him that is dispossessed must I hope not for the future abhor that treasonable Doctrine and Position of levying War by the King's authority against his person c. He tells us the Scripture makes no distinction between Rightful Kings and pag. 17. Usurpers The Rule is general Let every Soul be Subject to the higher powers c. Nor does the Scripture define to us who these higher Powers are And I 'm sure they are not the same every where In what person or persons the Powers lodge which here are said to be ordain'd of God and with what degree of Power they are invested depends upon the several Constitutions of Governments for if it be equally resisting God's Ordinance to Resist all Princes without distinction then I know no difference betwixt an absolute and a limited Monarchy then Princes have some dormant Authority or other which the Laws does not give 'em Which are Principles of slavery peculiar to this last Age and to some of the English Clergy He will not have St. Paul to be understood of lawful powers only for then it would be necessary for Subjects to examine the titles of Princes which would involve the Consciences of men in perplexitie for these are disputes amongst learned men and he cannot think that the resolution of Conscience in matters that all mankind are concerned in should depend upon such niceiies as learned men themselves cannot agree in He will hardly allow this Position with reference to matters of Religion which yet I think all mankind are or should be concerned in Nor ought a rule to be rejected upon a supposition that it is not clear because learned Men differ about it unless at the same time a New One be set up which all learned Men doe agree in But the disputes about Government are various and that amongst very learned men and yet to the best of my Observation all Men hitherto learned and unlearned have agreed that the Laws of a Nation and the Constitution of it's Government are at least a safe a true rule for Conscience which if we shall leave and follow some Ignis fatuus of a Schollar's Invention I know not whether it may lead us at last The Laws of a Nation may be trampled under foot and it's Constitution broken by an inundation of Foreigners this