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cause_n	according_a	law_n	person_n	1,451	5	4.8874	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A58921	A seasonable corrective to the one project for the good of England intended for God's glory and the good of souls, and dedicated to the King and his great Council.		1680 (1680)	Wing S2226; ESTC R13156	15,035	12

Protestants in opposition to the Popish Edicts of Charles the Fifth of Germany they take the name and title of Protestant in opposition to the wholesom Laws of Charles the Second of England 'T is granted likewise to be the Interest of all Protestants to unite against the forein Authority of the Pope but a Negative Vnion will signifie little to our security against the Power of it For such an Vnion we have with Turks Jews and Heathens who have an equal aversion to Popery with our selves But with this negative Union we see there may be and is a positive division and that Aphorism of our Saviour is still in force in spight of all such pretended negative Unions A Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand To keep up ours therefore there is a necessity of a compliance towards a firmer Union And if such as are thorowly addicted to this Church take fire at your aversions to it 't is out of a pious design to melt you into so much Christian Charity as may dispose you to run into one Communion that their Forces and yours united may be the stronger and the more effectual to oppose the common Enemy But that men who are espoused to the Church of England should at the same time be devoted to the Church of Rome or act a part for it Nothing but a stupid and affected Ignorance or a spiteful Malice could suggest For before they can do this they must be abandoned of their Reason and Common Sense too and yet thinking men cannot but look upon them as the most if I may not say the onely invincible Champions of this Orthodox Church against all Attempts of the Forein Power of Rome and this they find themselves obliged unto upon grounds irrefragable that is their certain knowledge that in giving way to the Popish Faction they should betray their Conscience and all their Interests together That the Church of Rome aims at the restauration of her Empire over us is no news to us To this end 't is visible she bestirs her self to inflame the Reckoning amongst Protestants But if it be her Artifice to personate the Dissenter as we see it is and not the true Conformist as the best Expedient she has left to compass her tyrannous and ambitious ends it must needs be of great importance with all Dissenters if conscientious to let fall their private Animosities against us and close with the Interest of this Church to frustrate the designs of Rome which their division helps to carry on Pag. 6. whereas their uniting in the common Interest would secure the Government from all danger of Subversion by rendering it too formidable for the Attempt This being the Case let us turn the Tables and take leave to ask the precise Dissenters of this Kingdom some few such Questions as this Projector puts to the Clergy of the Church of England mutatis mutandis Is Non-conformity to the Government and solemn Worsbip of God here established amongst us dearer to them than England 's Interest and the common cause of Protestancy Is their love to Church-division greater than to the Church it self and her Religion than to their native Countrey her Laws and Liberties Or lastly Whether in case they are sincere in their sorry Allegations for their Dissent which I confess ingenuously I am apt to suspect it is to be supposed that the present Non-conformists are better able of themselves to secure Protestancy and our Civil Interest against the Attempts of Rome than in conjunction with the Interest of the Church of England If they say Yes I would have them at the same time for the same reason give it under their hands that 't is a standing Rule in Arithmetick that one is more than six and that hitherto we have been all mistaken in the Art of Numbers Being brought to this pinch I conceive whatever they say they resolve to run the hazard of falling under the power and designs of Popery rather than suffer the present English Church to stand This is such a desperate piece of Bigotry to pay this Projector back in his own coyn as the Civil Government is highly concerned to discountenance for this dissipates the People impairs Trade foments Jealousies and endangers the Peace and Welfare of the whole And what should a Prince be more tender of than suffering the Civil Interest of a great People to be disturb'd and narrow'd for the humour of a dissenting peevish Party I might follow this great Projector through his whole Harangue and turn his whole Train of Artillery upon himself and beat off at least if not quite batter down all the Pretensions of the dissenting Brethren with it But I 'le spare them onely I cannot forbear to tell him that he does not carry himself so ingenuously as he should do towards that Sovereign Authority which he declares should not be superseded or controlled in what it does determine for when he has sharpened his Weapon and made it keen enough for Execution he turns the edge of it directly and purposely against the establish'd Law of that Sovereign Authority Whereas if he had dealt honestly like a good Subject according to his own Principles the Arguments which he draws from the danger of our divisions should have been press'd not upon the Church but the Non-conformists For 't is clear they are Dissenters to the Law or at least offer to supersede and controul the Government before they do actually divide themselves from our Communion And here I must tell this Confident Projector they do controul the Civil Government whose Act Will and Determination that Law is And to go a little further with him I shall grant him that the difference betwixt the Papist and the Protestant is not precisely Religious nor chiefly such 't is a Civil Empire and a Secular Interest consequent thereto which the Church of Rome aims at though they are cunning enough to palliate their Pretences with the specious but frivolous distinction of In ordine ad spiritualia And I think there are very few discerning persons guilty of that mistake which this Projector would seem to rectifie in that case But before he pretends to remove the other Mistake as he calls it let him attempt to do a miracle that is to remove mountains Betwixt Protestants we must understand those of the Church of England and their Dissenters there is no civil difference if we may take his word for it Those Dissenters are at a Ne plus ultra on the behalf of the English Government as well as themselves They neither acknowledge nor submit to any other Authority They hold the one common Civil Head and not onely acquiesce in the distribution of Justice by Law but embrace it as the best part of their Patrimony And I pray how long is' t since this Hercules has become so tame or weary as to set up his pillars with this Inscription Is King CHARLES that common Head and is he so In all Causes and over all Persons

Do not some of the Dissenters complain of rigour and severity though they have little reason when they are punished for their Non-conformity If these Inflictions what e're they be were not according to Law and Justice we should hear of them with a witness not by way of Complaint but Indictment But sure this Projector is a very young man or he has a very short memory or else he designs to impose upon his Reader That they are for a Plus ultra as to Reformation they have declared in Print by a Pamphlet that bears that Title and is it not per force that they sit down under the Negative as to Civil Government Is it not their fate rather than their choice and satisfaction that they are fain to be subject to our common Head Do they not long for a change Do not some of the Party aim and endeavour at it This Projector tells us David could not wear Saul's Armour and true Protestants he should have said of the Church of England cannot use Popish Weapons Imposition and Persecution But will he vouch for the Presbyterians Let us send him into Scotland to take Recognizance of those Brethren and when he has done that let him come home and read over Mr. Hobbs his History of the Civil Wars and bring us in good Bail to secure us of the good Behaviour of that Party which is here in so great vogue with him And will he give Security for the rest of the Church and State Phanaticks Perhaps he never read of the Pranks that were plaid in Germany by John of Leyden Phifer and Knipperdoling but has he forgot the Impulse and Effort of Venner in the City of London Jan. 9 1660. or the Insurrection of the Brethren of Scotland this last Somer Men may be true to their civil Interest in cool bloud but they grow mad and rage for what their phrensie calls Religion And when men begin to kick against Church Government though they may be tame and modest for a season 't is not their virtue but the sense of their weakness that makes them Like the Serpent newly taken out of the Snow 't is their unactive cold and numness that keeps you safe while you have them in your bosom do but let them grow warm and vigorous you 'le find they have a sting and venom too And if we take our measures from the spirit of this Projector when we find how bold and restless he is in his scribling against a standing Law and the determinations of the Supreme Authority which he confesses ought to be incontrollable to propagate his new Opinions which look too much like a design to advance Irreligion and Atheism what an emphasis would he set upon his Doctrine if he could strike all Laws dumb and put Authority to silence Whereas we see now onely the scratch of the Pen we might then feel the force of his Pistols and the edge of his Toledo and he may come to a confidence of dogmatizing so sharply that nothing but the force of a stronger Arm will be able to resist him And he is little vers'd in story who understands not that they of the Concision all Sectarians are of a sanguinary Constitution And is it not great pity but our Code of wholesom Laws should be pulled in pieces and that the Church Government which can prescribe for the same date with Christianity should be taken down and the decent Forms of God's solemn Worship abolish'd though all these have been abundantly justified by learned Pens and holy Martyrs yet is it not pity I say but they should be all cancell'd and utterly cashier'd to gratifie such a godly Party as affect Empire and are ambitious to be uppermost as soon as they can gain a safe and handsom opportunity to effect it For let them look never so demurely and carry themselves with as much meekness and humility as that familiar Spirit which governs them can suggest yet have they malice and pride enough to bind their Kings in chains and their Nobles with links of Iron Such Honour without all doubt this Set of Saints aspires unto And this strikes both at our Rights Civil and Sacred our Law Religion and Conscience to have any Rome-bred Usurpation as well as Forein Jurisdiction imposed here upon us So that these men drawing into question and danger the Constitution and Government to which as this Projector well observes Scripture and Nature Pag. 7. and Civil Pact oblige their fidelity and obedience there seems a discharge upon the Civil Government from any further care of their Protection who make it a piece of conscience to seek its ruin and which is worse who govern themselves by this stubborn Principle not to be informed of better things for here not Reason or Law but the Phanatic will be his own Judge In the mean while they make it their business to pay off the conformable Clergy who as this Projector wickedly and without all shame or charity suggesteth valuing themselves by their respects to the Church and tenderness of her Independent Honour have the opportunity with the less suspicion of letting in Popery at the back door And why this malicious Insinuation Onely because seeing by our new Lights every day more Reason than heretofore to be out of love with Innovations they keep up close to their old measures of Religion and Loyalty For this our Projector upbraids them as persons that are misguided by stiff and rigid Principles that walk in masquerade and wear the guise of Friends and yet still play the gawdy but empty name of Church against the Civil Interest and Religion of the Nation As if forsooth the Religion of the Nation were not within but without the Church and the Supreme Authority had set up a Church against its own Civil Interest But hereby this Projector tells his Reader the great Churchmen shew themselves deserted of God whose Providence Experience tells us hath hitherto preserved them by little less than Miracle But thus the blaspheming Adversary said of our late Sovereign and our blessed Saviour when they had a mind to murder them Good God! Whither will not Pride and Faction carry us Why what evil have these great Churchmen done Men so eminent for their parts and vertue that the World grows mad it can find no matter of Accusation against them no ground to quarrel with them but such as the Presidents and Princes had against the Prophet Daniel Dan. 6.4 5. 't was concerning the Law of his God though the truth is their envy sprung up at the King's favour toward him for his wisdom and faithful service And really he that shall duly observe the Character and Practice of these men cannot but conclude that had they lived in those days and under that Jurisdiction of Moses and Aaron who were obliged to be very strict in Discipline as well as in matters of Form and Ceremony they would most certainly have been in the crowd and cry with Corah and