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cause_n	begin_v	great_a	time_n	1,599	5	3.2122	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A84228	An examination of the Seasonable and necessarie warning concerning present dangers and duties, emitted from the commissioners of the General Assembly of the Kirk of Scotland, unto all the members of that Kirk. June 25 1650. Which was printed at Edinburgh by Evan Tyler, by a servant of the Common wealth of England, and a lover of the armie.	Servant of the Common wealth of England, and a lover of the armie.; Church of Scotland. General Assembly. Seasonable and necessary warning and declaration.	1650 (1650)	Wing E3729; Thomason E608_13; ESTC R201955	37,035	48

all the people of GOD throughout the Land would bee careful to discern of dangers and avoid snares from and compliances with both Sectaries and Malignants so would Ministers bee diligent and faithful in pressing of these duties and that in a solid and convincing way and labor to make it appear that they speak not against the one or the other from passion or interest but upon the grounds of divine reason and from the light autoritie of Gods Word that so they may make themselvs manifest to the consciences of their hearers stop the mouth of gain-sayers Finally all the inhabitants of the Land should beware of pride and carnal confidence and in an humble way should wait upon the LORD and tread the steps of holiness and righteousness and hee who hath don great things for us shall yet save us A. KER 10 You judg rightlie that there bee store of Malignants it may thank you and your Cabals The Answer that wee have so manie among us your joyning with them and espousing their Interest hath more strengthened their hands than anie proceedings of the Sectaries Hath not your receiving the head of Malignants for your King who hath been bred up in no other companie nor followed other counsels and whose heart is with them though hee came to you to serv turns upon you more hardened their hearts in their way and animated them in their proceedings than anie thing that the Sectaries have ever don toward them Wee com now to the particulars of your recommendation 1. And to this first wee have nothing to say but desire that you and wee also may without hypocrisie do the thing you advise unto 2. To the second if you mean by contending earnestly for the faith not anie use of outward carnal strife but an earnest strife of the soul in it self in the spirit with God for his gracious manifestation of the matter of our faith wee agree for so much onely wee must expunge your there last words conteining a limitation to your Land for you maie no more make your selvs a Catholick rule then Rome maie do 3. Wee desire you impartially to examine your hearts and see if there bee not in you a great deal of enmitie against the work and people of God which is ordinarily the work of an Antichristian pride whereby you are apt to think that you are and that there are no other the people of God but your selvs And this causeth your jealousie of and discontent and enmitie against anie other that laie claim to that priviledg if they bee not also of the same complexion with you with whom you will not convers least you should bee unprejudiced and so run in danger of a Kirk-censure by having a better opinion perhaps of a Sectarie and thereby have your zeal brought to a Christian temper and directed to move rationally according to its object Wee must tell you too that there are som of your faction in this Land Malignants jure divino who by their insinuations and secret infusions do foment faction and sow division and disobedience to the Government of this Common-wealth and while they will pretend a conscientiousness do more harm to the Peace of the Land then the worst of the old Malignants These wee shall mark and caus them to avoid or otherwise put them into a condition not much capable of doing us mischief 4. It had been much more your wisdom and your happiness if you had taken diligent heed to have had nothing to do with your King who is not like to bee much bound up by the desires of your Kirk though you recede nothing from them or will your Religion bee verie secure by it As for the peace of your Kingdom lookers on think you have by espousing his quarrel made it verie difficult to establish and settle Wee in England think you have more waies then one provoked God and you are like enough to bee plunged into a deep pit of a lasting miserie 5. Wee have onely here with sad and tender hearts to lament the woful blindness and unsavouriness that your formalitie and hypocrisie by the just judgment of God hath brought upon you That upon so serious an occasion as this is you should have no other rule to direct your actings and forbearings by but the condemnations of your Kirk and your Covenant Wee blush and mourn while wee read these passages Wee Sectaries are scandalized at it 't is not your waie to make us your Proselytes For wee believ and hold forth that the sacred Scriptures are the rule of all things to bee believed and to bee don Obtrude not your Covenant nor the Kirk upon us wee shall condemn them both if they either bee or do anie thing that is contrarie to that sacred rule Are these expressions becoming these times of light wee thought them times of darkness when the Scriptures were forgotten and the sentences the decrees the decretals and extravagants were made the rule of a Christian faith and practice How come's your Church to have gotten such credit that it should bee emulous with Rome for infallibilitie Accustom your selvs therefore to Canonical language and talk not of Gods interest while you measure it not by God's Word though by the waie wee must tell you that word Interest sounded with God is hardly concord in our ears 6. You lost your advantage and defence when you became Invaders you should have needed no defence against us if you had not begun to invade and proceed in such waies as declare you still enemies If you had been righteous it had been well for your selvs and us too and when you are brought to a condition to bee so unrighteous no more and that wee have such an assurance of it as you cannot break wee shall not desire longer to pursue you and if this tenderness of not moving till God goe's before you had possessed your Parlament in 1648 wee are confident you had never invaded England 7. By this it seem's you are not sure of your King your selvs doubt whether hee bee real or not and free from malignant principles What meant you to bee troubled with him upon these uncertain terms here was somthing at the bottom wil finde you out at last You were in the beginning of you paper verie tender of joining with Malignants or having anie in your Armie why not so as well as have an Armie for a Malignant for it seem's your selvs dare not undertake hee is not one 8 Wee wholy like your Counsel to your Ministers and wish you would take the same Cours the next Papers you Emit then perhaps wee might receiv som information or conviction for wee profess our selvs readie to receiv it when from those grounds and principles and wee would have you define or describe a Seclarie and tell us wherein is the poyson of their opinions and practice for the name hath no harm in it And wee begin to take it up and wear it verie contentedly it seem's to us also that manie of those men you so call are of the best among us God hath honor'd them to do great service to this Nation for that caus wee both love and honor them and think wee have greater reason to do so becaus you hate them for wee know you pursue an interest quite contrarie to ours 9. In this you are short you should have added hypocrisie to your pride and carnal confidence And truly if they would leav off their swearing uncleanness and drunkenness among you which is so verie general it would do well And if in a deep and true humilitie they would retire into themselvs and search their hearts and turn from all their evil waies and walk in the waies of righteousness and holiness a thing much spoken of and arrogated by manie that neither have it nor understand what 't is and meet the Lord in the waie of his judgments and endeavor to agree with their adversarie while hee is in the way yee may vet bee safe which would bee verie desirable so wee may bee satisfied and safe also FINIS

look well to your selvs and see if there bee not a great deal of that same thing among you that you take not notice of certainly 't is not confined to Rome and Romane vvorship 't is everie where more or less and grosly and formally where 't is little taken notice of Wee denie not but much of it is in England but you have taken your marks about it much amiss and know not at all wherein 7 The success of that partie provs not the goodness of their caus or that they shall prosper still Warning The Lord who it wonderful in counsel and excellent in working hath been pleased to put the rod of his anger and the staff of his indignation in their hand for executing of his wrath against Malignant becaus of the enmitie and opposition of that generation unto the caus and people of God But if they shall invade this land and exalt themselvs against the Lords inheritance and the people that are in Covenant with him For whose sake the Lord did cloath them with power for a time for taking vengeance upon his enemies Then shall they stumble and fall and bee broken in pieces Though the host of Senacherib did prevail against Samaria yet did they fall in Judah and hee did return with shame and was slain with the sword in his own land That partie hath as yet no caus to boast that God bath prospered them in Arms against the Covenant or against a praying people stedfast in the Lords caus following his way and waiting upon him for help and success All their encounters have hitherto been against Malignants and now the Lord having performed so much of his work against that generation who know's but the Sectaries day may also be coming and that when the state of the question shall bee changed God may turn his hand upon them and bring upon them the judgments of a broken Covenant as hee hath ever don to all that look that way 7 Wee acknowledg that greatness of success neither evidence's the goodness of a Caus Answer nor give 's assurance of its own continuance What success the merciful providence of God hath given to the Armies of this Nation we desire humbly and thankfully to acknowledg and rejoice in and rejoice not an our selvs or arrogate anie thing of prais or honor which is onely due to the Lord of hosts in whose hand wee were Instruments and of our selvs are nothing The Lord who is indeed wonderful in counsel and excellent in working hath been pleased to execute his wrath by us against Tyrannie and against that caus which you have now espoused And having now called our Armies also to go against an hypocritical Nation Wee shall proceed with confidence that wee shall also bee inabled to chastize their breach of Treaties and most wicked and perfidious Invasion of this Nation And do not think your distinguishing your selvs from Malignants will bee your shield against Divine justice as if there were none but that generation against whom his wrath were kindled And indeed should they prevail onely against and destroy that sort of people among you it would leav your poor land verie much unpeopled for wee verie well know you have fortie Malignants to one that is devoted to your Kirk You say that partie hath not yet prospered in Arms against the Covenant Wee need not fight with the Covenant it is com to nothing without it it was brought a little too near the Ark and 't is faln like Dagon and there let it lye But were there no Covenanters in Hamiltons Armie Was not that Parlament that sent them a Covenanting Parlament Can there bee such a thing in Scotland as a Parlament not Covenanting yet Dagon was then faln and had neither head nor hands it could neither advise nor help which hath Divine Ordination and Institution when it shall bee idolized provokes to jealousie him that will not give his glorie to another The Brazen Serpent was set up by Divine command and more wonderful effects wrought by looking upon it at Gods command then wee ever yet saw your humane invention of the Covenant produce where it hath been imposed yet when 't was made an Idol hee is commended that brake it in pieces and called it Nehushtam The Temple was astructure of Gods own contrivance and prescription and built and furnished with no small charge and there was in it greater mysteries then are perhaps of all men understood yet when the people made an Idol of it and put their confidence in it crying out The Temple of the Lord The Temple of the Lord while they committed all abomination God gave up to destruction both it and them You have too much cryed up the Covenant and the Kirk of Scotland and taught the people to trust too much in them for the continuance or safetie of either of them And while you talk of a praying people wee are not much scar'd at it consider whether your prayers have not been your provocations wee mean not those onely which were offered up with your drink-offerings for the health of your King when you kindled so manie fires all over your streets if not to the Host of Heaven yet to Liber Pater and for the Heathenish celebration of those Lyaean Mysteries But wee mean also even those hypocritical houlings of your ignorant crouds when they keep time to your passion and the ebullitions of your dark zeal invoking vengeance from Heaven with a spirit of love and meekness no doubt becoming Gospel-administrations against the Sectaries who are men you know not onely your selvs have painted them black that you might with the more intention of heat and malice hate them These your horrible mis-carrings have quite lost you with all wise and good men onely with such Papers as these you still baffle your own people and keep them under slaverie and subject them to a danger which is by everie compassionate spirit to bee much pittied If you bee angrie at this plain dealing you may thank your selvs if you care not what you say to delude the people wee must tell ours the truth to undeceiv them And let not those few in Scotland who truly fear God for wee have heard there bee a few such though but a verie few bee kindled at this plain dealing which the pride hypocrisie of this Paper hath necessitated not least they should still bee wise not onely in their own conceits for of that cure wee have no hope but least they should still appear what they are not to the judgments of others and thereby dangerously deceiv them 8 Wee desire that not onely others Warning but the Sectaries themselvs may consider that when England was verie low and well nigh brought under the feet of the Popish Prelatical and Malignant Partie That this Nation was then much solicited for their assistance and relief and even by som of these who have since that time been verie active and instrumental for

their resolutions to observ the rule of Remonstrating first the breaches of peace of craving just reparations of using all fair means of giving a preceding warning of three moneths before anie engagement in these Kingdoms in war and do hold forth this waie gf procedour in clearing each others and dealing plainly as agreeable not onely to particular Treaties and to the manie Ties Bonds and Declarations past betwixt the Kingdoms but also to the Law of God and practice of his people in his Word and to the common law and practice of Heathen Nations much more of Christian Coveanted Kingdoms And plainly profess their confidence that the Covenanted GOD of these Kingdoms who did take order with these of this Nation who did unlawfully engage against England doth still live and reign and will bring shame and ruine upon whatsoever partie in either of these Nations that without a necessarie caus and clear calling and without observance of the aforesaid rules and order shall offend and invade the other Nation In all which wee do agree with them in our judgments and resolutions and conceiv that the whole Land is bound to tread the same steps and to walk according to the same rules 9 This your 9th Paragraph is so fully answered in the Paper this week published Intituled The Answer Colonel Grey's Portmanteau opened that wee shall not add a line of it more but refer the Reader thither this beeing but the recapitulation and Epitome of that Letter 10 Albeit wee bee diligently to take heed af the danger that threaten's from Sectaries Warning and faithfully to bestir our selvs in our places and stations in the use of all lawful and necessarie means for preventing of the same Yet are wee not to forget but also with the same diligence and care to take heed of these dangers and snares that threaten the work and people of God from Malignants Malignancie though a verie evil weed yet is not pluck't up but still continue's to bee one of the raging sins of this Land it beeing the snare wherewith loos hearts who cannot endure Christ's yoke are most readily taken Hence it is that there bee still manie of that stamp in all the three Kingdoms who drawing encouragements to themselvs from the influence they have upon the King's Counsels and hardning themselvs in their waie by the proceedings of Sectaries do still follow their former designs and wait for their daie and would rejoice in the ruine or halting of these who adhere to the Covenant And experience prov'es that manie of these who have seem'd to repent of and abandon that waie yet do not really shake off that sin that hang's so fast on but upon new temptations fall again upon that same wickedness and prove wors then before which may bee a caution to us not suddenly to trust them Wee make no doubt but that Malignants will by all means endeavor that there may bee room left for them to undermine the work and people of God and engage the Kingdom in a new War upon terms of their devising destructive to Religion and the Covenant In reference to dangers upon the right hand and upon the left besides anie dutie alreadie represented to us Wee conceiv it incumbent to us seriously to recommend the following particulars to all the Land especially to these that are in trust either in Judicatories or Armies 1. First to watch and praie that in nothing they bee deceived or com short of the dutie whereunto the Lord call's them in a time of so manie temptations and great difficulties 2. Everie one would labor not onely for the knowledg of the Truth but to have the power and love thereof engraven on their hearts that they may from an in ward principle of grace and spiritual life avoid Error and all the snares which lead thereunto and bee encouraged to contend earnestly for the Faith which God hath been pleased to deliver to his Kirk in this Land 3 Not onely is open Malignancie to bee avoided but men would watch that enmitie against the work and people of GOD which ordinarily is the birth of jealousie and discontent and of familiar conversing with such as are dis-affected to or lukewarm in the caus of GOD steal not into their hearts and gain not upon their affections by degrees Experience almost of all back-sliding times and persons hath proved that the fellowship of men of a dis-affected or lukewarm temper blunt's the edg of tenderness and zeal and steal's away the heart first from honest instruments and then from the caus it self There have bin are still som in the Land who in a cunning way of insinuation foment jealousies and act divisions whilst they seem to bee friends to the Caus and by this means do more harm then others by open violence These wee would mark and avoid them that wee may neither endanger our selvs nor give offence unto others nor prejudice the Caus of GOD. 4 Wee would take diligent heed that in nothing wee recede from the just and necessarie desires of this Kirk and Kingdom propounded to his Majestie for securing of Religion and setling the peace of the Kingdom But that wee cleav closely to our former resolutions in those things If wee remit and grow slack and yield in anie of them as it shall increas the hopes and endeavors of carnal and dis-affected men so shall it provoke GOD against us to leav us to our selvs till we be plunged in a pit of backsliding 5 It concern's us to take heed that wee do not tread the steps of those who carried on the late unlawful engagement against the Kingdom of England in anie thing alreadie condemned by the Kirk and Kingdom especially to beware of changing the state of our Caus or altering the matter of our quarrel either by laying aside of GOD's interest taking up of man's or by preferring or equalling man's interest unto GODS This were to turn upside down the whole tenor of our Principles and Procedours and not onely to spoil us of all the comfort wee can look for from our Covenant but also to bring upon our selvs the guilt and reproach of all the sin of those who carried on that engagement so much condemned and born testimonie against in this Land 6 Wee would beware of losing the advantage of defenders seeing our strength most consist's in the equitie and clearness of the Caus and the holie and righteous way in pursuing of the same It shall be better for us rather to endure straits for a time then by precipitating and making haste in the dark to rush against the wall and spoil our selvs of that peace and comfort which wee may have in waiting till GOD go before us 7 Wee desire that all the Land may bee still pouring out their praiers and supplications before GOD that the King's Majestie may really and wholly abandon all Malignant principles and counsels and join cordially in the Covenant and Caus of GOD. 8 As