boasting insolent outrageous Hypocritical false The Sâ—ctaries on the other hand call the Assembly Antichristian Romish Bloody Plagues and Pests the Kingdom Baals Priests Southsayers The Preâ—byterian Government a Limb of Antichrist Tyrannical Lordly an Aegyptian Bondage An Anabaptist said He hoped to see Heaven and Earth on fire before Presbytery should be settled and to see it trodden under foot as the Bishops Sterâ—y himself says The Seed of God hath two Capital Enemies Romish Papacy and the Scotch Presbytery See what the Presbyterians say now to Toleration It is much says the London Ministers Letter to the Assembly Jan. 1. 45. that our Brethren should separate from the Church but that they should endeavour to get a Warrant to authorize their Separation from it and to have Liberty by drawing Members out of it to weaken and diminish it till so far as lies in them they have brought it to nothing This we think to be plainly unlawful And then the Harmony of the Lancashire Ministers p. 12. Toleration would be the putting the Sword in a mad mans hand a proclaiming Liberty to the Wolves to come into Christs Flock to prey upon his Lambs Toleration mâ—kes the Scripture a Nose of Wax a Rule of Faith to all Religions And this is the great Rabby of the party Rutherfords free Disp p. 360. Liberty of Conscience and Toleration of all or any Religion is so prodigious an Impiety that this Religious Parliament cannot but abhor the very naming of it Baileys Disswasive Epist Ded. 1645. It is unreasonable says the Defender of the London Ministers Letter to the Assembly Anti-toleration p. 16 that Indepâ—ndents should desire that Toleration of Presbyters which they would not give to Presbyters Let it be observed from hence that these people do first demand of the Government that Liberty which they deny to one another And Secondly That they pretend to do it upon Conscience and yet hold the thing it self to be absolutely unlawful so that they justifie the Conscience of our denying it to them by the Conscience of their refusing it to others And the only way to evade this is to discover all by confessing that though they now beg a Toleration from the Government yet if they get power in their hands they 'l make a Conscience again as they did before of allowing any freedom to the Government It is a nlear case that their demands are unwarrantable impracticable unreasonable and not grounded upon Conscience but directly in opposition to it as we have it under their own hands Let us try now if we can discover what the design is since it appears manifestly what it is not and that not only from the reason of the thing but from their own deeds and writings and those matters also and positions expounded by practise One thing remarkable is this That they have been still fishing in troubled Waters and taking advantage of all Dâ—stresses and necessities of the Government Did not Cartwright Coppinger Arthington and Hacket take their time for that exeerable Conspiracy against Q. Elizabeth when she was just upon the very point of securing the reformed Religion against the Power and Church of Rome Did not the Sectaries in 1641. take the same advantage against the late King when his thoughts were wholly taken up about suppressing the Irish Rebellion And did not the latter Scotch Tumults take the same advantage of his Majesties being under many troublesome Circumstances about the Plot and when the peoples minds were prepared to take ill Impressions in the matter of Government So that the very timeing of this revived Clamour for Liberty of Conscience looks suspiciously and the more because their Meetings here have of late been very little interrupted To run through those pestilent principles which the Heads of the Sectaries have publish'd in their own names were endless Wherefore I shall content my self with some of their general positions and refer the Reader to Husbands Collections or the Authors themselves for the rest as Milton Goodwin Rutherford and a hundred more They make the Lords and Commons the supream Power nay the people themselves in some cases Princes they say may be deposed and put to death They distinguish betwixt the Kings person and his authority the Letter of the Law and the Equity of it and appeal from the written Law to the Law of Nature and according to these maxims they govern their proceedings But will you see now the price of all our Blood and Confusion Upon their Petition to his Majesty for a Reformation of the Liturgy the King most graciously issued out a Commission for a Review of the Book of Common Prayer An equal number of learned Divines both Episcopal and Presbyterian were appointed to meet about it and to agree upon such Alterations as should be thought most necessary His Majesty earnestly desiring that the Ministers would not totally lay aside the Book of Common Prayer but read those parts against which there could be no Exception Now instead of most necessary Alterations and those to be agreed upon by both Parties they published a new Liturgy of their own under the Title of the Reformation of the Liturgy which is indeed the Abolition of it I 'le give ye only a tast of some of their important scruples that are cast into the ballance against the Vnity of the Church and the Peace of the Kingdom They turn Wedded Wife into Marryed Dost thou Believe into Do you Believe and all this I stedfastly Believe into this I do unfeignedly Believe Let us now suppose these people had their Askings Let any man but shew me from the Minority of K. James to this hour where they were not the more violent and importune upon yielding even to the hazard of a downright Rebellion the Author shall give any man his Head for the President Did not the Assembly in 1578. impose upon the Parliament in Scotland fall foul upon the Archbishop of Glasgow and the whole Order pass a Decree against their votes in Parliament command them to renounce their Temporal Titles Civil Jurisdiction set their Quarriers at work for the demolishing of Glasgow Cathedral which had been done too if the Tradesmen had not by force prevented it And did they not grow bolder and bolder upon the Kings Lenity and command the Bishops upon pain of Excommunication not to officiate as Pastors without Licence from the General Assembly and likewise order the Patrimony of the Church to be disposed of as they should see meet And did they not after that make a violent and treasonous Seizure of the King at Ruthven and justifie it when they had done And so on by degrees till his Majesty was forc'd by a Tumult at Edenbourgh in 1596. and the Ministers Bond of Confederacy immediately upon it to a Resolution of rigour and severity which as Spottswood observes gave him more quiet and security for the future His Majesty was no sooner enter'd upon the Government of England but he was
assaulted in 1604. with the same sort of people and at a Conference at Hampton Court this Qustion was put How far an Ordinance of the Church was binding without offence to Christian Liberty Whereupon the King gave this short Answer Let 's have no more of these Questions but conform at your peril So that they gave him no further trouble upon that subject And this was Queen Elizabeth's case too to the hazard both of her Life and Government till by that severe Act against them of the Thirty fifth of her Reign she gave her self ease for the remainder of her Life What did the late King gain by his Indulgence to the Scots in 1637. but farther Indignities and Contempt First the service-Service-Book and Canons were their Grievance then the Five Articles of Perth though established both by the General Assembly and Parliament The High Commission next and then the Bishops Session in Civil Judicatories His Majesty gratifieâ— them in every point Insomuch that they had nothing further to complain of but that the King would not abolish Episcopacy and admit the Authority of their Lay-Elders upon which point they brake out into an open Rebelion After this upon the Interview of the two Armies at Berwick when the King had them absolutely at his mercy upon their Supplication for a Treaty he trusted them again and concluded upon a Pacification of which the Covenanters did not keep so much as one Aâ—ticle Upon his Majesties return to London he passes the Triennial Bill abolishes the Star-Chamber and High Commissiâ—n-Court passes an Act for the Continuance of the Parliament and in fine denys them nothing but his Crown and his Blood and then by virtue of what he had given them already they took away the rest and stript him of his Friends his Authority his Revenue and his Life They minister great cause of suspicion in their very stile and scruples Why do they run so much upon ambiguities As the settling of Religion in its due latitude a due necessary Reformation found Relief Principles congruous to a National Settlement the Kings Iust Rights Importance of Interests Stated Order in the Church c. What is all this but a jumbling together of so many Amusements to pass a colourable pretence upon the people And it signifies just nothing but what Construction they shall think fit to allow it If they would offer any pertinent intelligible and practicable Proposition and say what Injunctions they would have abated what Parties they would recommend for these qualifications where to find them and who shall judge of them If they would state their Demands and say This is all we ask and then rest there If 28 they plead for all Dissenters they would produce some common Instrument or Commission to shew that they are authâ—riz'd by all to solicite in their Names and to treat upon such or such Points and to go no further the business might be brought yet to some rational issue As their Stile is exceeding dark and mysterious so are their Scruples of an extraordinary Quality too They cannot kneel at the Sacrament but they can hold up their hands at the Covenant they can dispense with the Oath of Allegiance and yet make a scruple of disclaiming the Solemn League They can swallow a Schism or worse and yet a Ceremony choaks them Add to all this many of those very persons that promoted our former Troubles this very way are now at work again upon the same pretension and may without breach of Charity be suspected to have the same design and to remain in a state of impenitency if they have not manifested their Repentance by some open Recantation For according to the Casuists publique sins require publick confessions It is an ill sign too for a man to leap upon the sudden from matter of Conscience to Reason of State and in the same breath of a petitioner to become a reformer It would seem a strange thing for a man to request a special favour from the Master of a Family and at the same time to put affronts upon his Domesticks and to tell him that his Servants were all of them a pack of Rascals which is not much from the point in hand We have had abundance of Advice to the Free-holders of England toward the Choice of this next Parliament as Sober and seasonable Quaeries Englands great Interest the Freeholders Choice and twenty more and all of them agreeing in the general Heads one with another They tell us who are fit to be chosen and who not The former such as will remove and bring to Justice evil Counsellors corrupt and arbitrary Ministers of State detect and punish the Pensioners of the former Parliament in the face of the Kingdom and they must chuse such as will secure us from Slavery The people are directed on the other side not to chuse a man that has been reputed a Pentioner no Court-Officer or whose Employment is durante bene placito no ambitious men or Non-residents that live here in Town and seek Honour and preferments above This is the Counsel of Englands grand Interest And methinks in these Qualifications there is both too much and too little As to the point of Evil Counsellors corrupt Ministers and Pensioners he should have done well to have advi'sd them all manner of caution and circumspection for fear of mistaking their Men. This was the way that brought the Earl of Strafford and the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury to their Ends. under the notion of evil Counsellors too though perhaps the most necessary Instruments that ever this Nation enjoyed for the Common Good both of King and people So that as it is a great Service to bring corrupt Ministers to publick Justice it is yet a lewd method to make the Rabble the Executioners and to punish Male-Administration by Sedition For in this case the good and the bad fall indifferently without distinction and instead of drawing here and there a piece of rotten Timber toward a Reparation they fall foul upon the main pillars and supporters of the House so that all falls into ruins And then the mark of a Reputed Pensioner goes a little too far for it lies in the power of two or three malevolent Tongues to make any man so They that made the last King a reputed Papist shall much more easily make any of his Majesties Subjects pass for reputed Pensioners The total Exclusion of all Court-Officers or Bene-placito-men is yet worse For this sets up a direct Opposition betwixt the King and his people as who should say Trust no body that wears any Token of the Kings favour And the same reason disables him as well to any other Trust whatsoever So that the Kings Countenance is a kind of Incapacity And it is the same thing with those he calls Ambitious Men as if any Application to his Majesty made a man unfit for the Service of his Country He should have done well to have warn'd them against the known Enemies of the
at the same lock again But what are these people for the love of God that are thus miserably us'd all this while Why truly if we may take their own words for 't under Q. Elizabeth they were Loyal Subjects and Gods faithful servants most worthy faithful and painful Ministers learned and godly unreproveable before all men the Strength of the Land and the Sinew of her Majesties Government Under K. James they were men of Conscience preservers of the Churches Right and asserters of the Holy Discipline Under the late King they took up the Titles of men of tender Consciences well-affected men that had the power of Godliness painful laborious preachers of the Word faithful in their Generation and men zealous in the defence of the Protestant Religion the Priviledges of Parliament and of his Majesty in his Iust Rights And in our days they call themselves Lovers of God Ordinances and enemies of all humane Inventions a people zealous of Religion sound in the Faith intelligent sober numerous peaceable orthodox The Ceremonies they look upon as an Excess they dissent from the outward Order of Worship for the Conscience will interpose in the Dictates and Injunctions of men in Divine Worship all these people agreeing in this common Complaint that they are persecuted for worshipping according to Coâ—science Whether they do well or ill whether they speak true or false whether they have Reason on their side or not in these Remonstrances let the Reader judge Let it be first observ'd that the Author dates this persecution from his Majesties Return near these 20 years he sayâ— â—s if there had never been any such thing before whereas from the time of Q. Elizabeths Act above-mentioned to the very Act of Vniformity the late times excepted â—he Church was never without a legal provision for the preventing suppressing of Conventicles and the much Law more rigorously put in execution Beside that as they were more or less indulged the Nâ—tion was still more or less at quiet Observe again that there 's no notice taken of the Liberty of the late times or the deplorable Effects of that Licence though the Presbyterians little Fâ—nger was heavier then the Loyns of the Bishops in the point of Restraint as we have shew'd already from the mouths of the other Sectaries But they are too prudent to fall foul one upon another when their business is to joyn in a Consederate party against the Government so that they are now One and All and every separate Opinion sticles for all the rest And then comes on the Cry of the Oâ—phans and Widdows against the cruelty of the Oppressor Sixty pouunds distrain'd for twelve Two hundred for Sixty c. Methinks the Plaintiff should have been so ingenuous as to have reflected upon the persecuâ—ions that other men suffered even from these people that now complain of a persecution that they suffâ—red for worshipping according to their Consciences too and they had not only Religion on their side but Law also whereas the other founded a Rebellion upon a pretended scruple of Religion and opposed the Rules of Christianity and Civil Authority both in one But it is a persecution to them to be kept from persecuting Neither does this Clamour keep it self within the bounds of spiritual matters but breaks in upon the Civil Administration and alarms the multitude with the terrible apprehensions likewise of Tyranny Slavery Wherefore we are enforced to oppose the sensible Experiment of an actual Tyranny and slavery to the artificial and imaginary fears of it to leave all mortals without excuse that shall read these plain and well-meaning Papers if ever they should fall into the same mistakes again The taking away of mens Goods and Liberties the forcing of their Consciences and tying them up to an implicit Obedience to the Decrees of Government are terrbile things I must confess But yet much worse sure where they run directly against the Stream of a receiv'd Authority and Vsage then where the so doing is warranted by known Laws and uninterrupted Practice There are several sorts of persecution A persecution in matter of Conscience Good Name Propriety of Goods and Estate freedom of person and that is the most odious aggravation of persecution when it is set up in defiance of a publick Law and introduced under a colour of kindness to all these Interests We will be as short in these particulars as we can and leave the Reader to say where the Odium of the Persecution lies First to the point of Conscience It was the judgment of the late Royalists that they were obliged in conscience and duty to pay Obedience to the Laws both civil and ecclesiastical and with the hazard of their Lives and Fortunes to endeavour the preservation both of the Church and State The Protestant Dissenters pretended the same respect for the King and Church with the Royal party And when by popular pretexts they had ingraâ—iated themselves with the multitude they plaid their Game the contrary way and took up Arms against the Government which they swore to defend Now see at what a rate they treated not only the Friends of the Government but the Government it self There were a hundred and fifteen Ministers ejected within the Bills of Mortality beside Pauls and Westminster and in proportion all the Nation over for refusing to comply with the Schism and they were not so much as suffer'd to take the Employment of either a School-master or a Chaplain but under heavy penaltie Several of our Divines were choak'd up and poison'd in Peter-House and other Goals either for worshipping according to their Consciences or refusing to act against them No man admitted to compound or so much as live in the Parliaments Quarters without swearing Men were sequester'd for not joyning in the Rebellion for assisting the King according to the Law and for not Covenanting though in express Contradiction to the Oath of Allegiance Upon the Abolition of the Common Prayer severe penalties impos'd upon any man that should use it and their own Directory impos'd upon a Forfeiture too nay they would not allow the King himself in his Distresses the Comfort of any of his own Chaplains nor so much as the benefit of a Common-Prayer Book And at Fife in Scotland there was an Oath given at the Communion not to taâ—e the Kings Oath nor any other then their own Was all this an Invasion of the Liberty of Conscience or not Touching a persecution now upon the point of Good name Though the whole course of the History is full of virulent and unchristian Reflections I will only refer my self to that Diabolical Libel of Whites Centuries of scandalous Ministers wherein without any regard to truth or modesty they have expos'd so many reverend Names to Infamy and Dishonour In one word After they had represented the King himself for a Tyrant and an Idolater it was but Consonant that they should cast Reproaches upon his Party Touching the Freedom of our