attaining Knowledg Some are more deep and quick searching and industrious have better means and opportunities of knowing some can take in a greater Latitude of Circumstances and can compare Circumstances and the Things themselves and judg of the Good and Evil. I do not now take notice of the Blasses of Education Prejudices Prepossessions and Passions of Men nor the Influence of the World upon Mens Alterations And the true Reason of Resolution and Peace which Men have in these different ways is their Sincerity and strict Observance of their own Light and Judgment and the Purity of their Motives And from hence arises a Necessity of performing several Duties such as Let us not judg one another but forbear one another in Love Let us humbly acknowledg the Imperfection of our own Understandings We have not all Knowledg we know not other Mens Reasons Thoughts and Hearts We should amicably confer when we meet and hold our Candle to shew them the Way when we think theirs is out this is to be understood of doubtful Things and not clear Scripture Matters of Faith and Worship It should teach us Long-suffering and to mortify our Passions and tie up our Tongues and Hands from Persecution Better my Hand be cut off than that I stretch it out to strike any Man that is approved of God for such Things wherein he approves himself unto him Let us take our Divisions to Heart and think the Sufferings of our Brethren in this Life sufficient and too much and spare to condemn them so Hell as Hypocrites and evil Workers There are some Conformists within my knowledg that I am confident would never have conformed unless they had thought it had been their Duty and they have Peace therein They were not drawn in by Preferments nor driven in by Necessity There are and have been Nonconformists that are as clear in their Nonconformity I was well acquainted with one and I never was acquainted with a more loyal sincere holy Man After many Disgraces and sharp Trials especially to a generous genteel Spirit in England he went beyond Sea and in a terrible Storm at Sea which broke into the Ship he asked his own Soul If he could die in and for that Cause of his Sufferings and leaving his Native Country to preach in a strange Land His Conscience gave him a plain and full Answer when ready as he thought to leave his Body and dear Relations in a deep Sea After his Return he told me this and other Passages with a most sincere Profession That he had nothing told in this World but to serve Christ nor any thing to seek but Christ with whom I believe he is and with him will appear as one that shall judg the World Did that eminently learned and excellent Mr. Joseph Allen in or after his many Imprisonments terrible Convulsions and daily Self-examinations recoil from his Reasons for Nonconformity He was certainly so clear and resolved in this that in his last Conflict with the Devil three hours before his Death Satan did not attempt him there but this is remembred of him I care not to be longer in this dirty World than either my Master hath doing or suffering-Work for me were that done forewel to Earth Pag. 90. of his Life It was thought he would conform till he saw what Assent and Consent was required Another worthy Person Mr. Joseph Baker of Worcester did read the Service but went out and on his Death-Bed said He could have done any thing but sin Take a fourth Testimony that able Scholar and Minister Mr. John Thompson on his Death-Bed in a Chamber over a nasty Privy which was conceived to annoy him into a Fever in the Common-Goal at Bristol told his Friends that were about him As for my Bonds I bless God for them and if I had known when I came in that I should die here I would have done no otherwise than I have done Many more such Professions of Satisfaction might be gathered but I must not be tedious Neither were these the confident Sayings of fancyful Men but rational The first of these four debated the Case with one of the greatest Bishops in this Age and was more satisfied in his Dissent since he discoursed the Points And the last offered to dispute the whole Case with the Bishop and others that stood by with this Caution Tolle Legem fiat Certamen which was most disingenuously construed by some of them thus That he would have the Laws removed and fight it over again as it is in the Reply to the Bristol Narrative printed Anno 1675. And no less preparation of Mind could carry them through all kinds of Afflictions and Sufferings except Exile and the Ax or a more ignominious Death The Right Reverend Bishop of Cork can hardly believe the Brethren to be so poor as they are said to be But can they chuse but be poor If you consider their Number their Charge their small Time of enjoying their Livings the small Number of the rich and wealthy that do own them so far as to be their Patrons or Benefactors the great Losses of their best Friends by the Fire of London Decay of Trade and besides the long Taxes that lay upon them in common with others many of them have been great Sufferers in their own Estates Some Congregations having enough to do to afford a small Maintenance to their own Ministers and having many occasions to exhaust them to help them out of Prisons to maintain them in Prisons and many other ways constant Expence and Charge Besides these Considerations a few Arguments are convincing I read in the Life of that Gentlewoman of a great Mind and Contrivance Mrs. Baxter what his present Circumstances were and what reduced him into them How frugal and parsimonious that wise and good Man Mr. Jo. Corbet was that he might have to communicate to them that were in want And the good Sums of Money which that great Example and Trustee of Charity Mr. Tho. Gouge hath given out of his own Purse to some good Men in exigence besides some private Collections which have been made for some good Men of deserved Note Twenty or forty Pound is a good Collection but alas how little a way will it go how soon spent in a Family and such Collections must not come often about The Reverend Mr. B. tells us his Wife engaged to procure a Man of Note 20 l. but it fell so short that she to make good her charitable Undertaking paid 12 l. out of her own Purse These are next to Demonstrations And I doubt not but Mr Baxter can name the Men that live upon little more than brown Bread and Water I have heard of some in Cumberland that have but eight or ten Pounds per an to keep a Family so that a piece of Flesh hath not come to one of their Tables in six Weeks time their Allowance could scarce afford them Bread and Cheese One of them went to Plow six days and
and against any thing which some great Men would have we may imagine from what kind of Men such Representations were made And considering that such a Representation thus made to the King so long a Stranger in his own Kingdom by a Speaker in Parliament it is wonderful the King did not proceed to an utter Extirpation of all Nonconformists as Enemies to his Government and no Lovers of his Person in whom the Regality is invested And to tell the King that all Nonconformists are no Friends to the established Government was to motion a fair Reward of the Loyalty of very many who used all Endeavours to restore his Majesty and Government and to contradict what the King himself told the Ministers of London on the Day of his happy Return when the Reverend Mr. A. Jackron presented him with a Bibe in their behalf as he passed through St. Paul's Church-Yard to this effect That he must attribute his Restauration under God to their Prayers and Endeavours This spiritual Antipathy against good Men hath been very troublesom to many wise and moderate Magistrates and pressed out all the Sowrness of some Mens Spirits into the Cup of the Nonconformists and forced milder Natures into an obsequious Severity to Pride and Anger which could not be restrained from falling on these Men that were to be set at naught and they who shewed them respects forfeited the Civilities due to themselves I will conclude this Head with a few Instances of this Antipathy and Incivility A wealthy Citizen of very good quality in time of the Plague went to visit his native Country and secretly to distribute his Charity which was proportionable to his Estate and Mind and being in a Town in the Assize time was brought before some Justices of the Peace these demanded Bond for his Behaviour or else he must to Prison He understanding himself and being conscious there was no cause of Imprisonment refused the first and having a good Spirit a good Purse and good Counsel escaped the last After the Oxford Act came out a peaceable and inoffensive Nonconformist was constrained to think of a Removal from a convenient Settlement He was necessitated to leave his Family which Separation was next to an Exile to him and when he could come home to come in the Night He employed his Friends and rode about himself to find an Habitation After much enquiry he was directed to a very good convenient House which he was glad of with respect to his Wife who was a worthy Gentlewoman and bore her part of his Sufferings with decency and affection The Landlord was a Courtier The Minister took the House of him that was entrusted to let it gave Earnest brewed and prepared for his Settlement but before he could remove a Gentleman of that Neighbourhood who had no power either to let or hinder came and hung a Lock upon the Door of the House and wrote a Letter to the Landlord at London acquainting him with what he had done and begging his Pardon for the Presumption for he thought it was not fit that a Nonconformist should be his Tenant Surely this Gentleman looked upon a Nonconformist as the Samaritans upon the Jews and would deny him Water or not receive him into his House or bid him God speed And so the Gentleman was to seck again for an Habitation to his great perplexity and trouble A Gentleman of Quality and Truth gave me this Relation of one within his own knowledg One saith he a very worthy Person was sorely exercised with Witchcraft which the Witch confessing was brought before some Justices one of whom said to be a famous Persecutor bad her go home and if she bewitched none but Fanaticks she should never be troubled for him And so he had no relief from the Law nor Ease otherwise till the Witch died several Years after Did they who so strongly brought in our Terms foresee that there would be Nonconformists and that Nonconformity would not only eject them out of their Habitations and Benefices but out of Corporations and their own hired Houses but exclude them out of the common Right of Humanity and Justice then they have the greater cause to repent If they did not they are the more innocent Causes of many and great Troubles to many truly good Men and are engaged to endeavour their Deliverance from all these Troubles It is remarkable that the most active Instruments in this Anti-Evangelical Work have been none of the best but indeed the worst of Men. And of them it may be noted 1. What their Quality is and hath been 2. What their Impiety and heinous Wickedness of the grossest Nature 3. What their Success hath been 4. What Appearances have been of God against them and what their Ends have been Some of them have been convinced converted and taken off from this Way and Course and some have been made Examples of humane and divine Justice There are abundance of inferior Officers that are very vicious and dishonest and yet nothing is to be seen very remarkably differing them from other vicious and poor People but that of all Sorts of Instruments these Informers should be noted out by Divine Providence as Examples of notorious Vices Falshood Perjuries and miserable Deaths may be a Warning to the worst of Men not to grow so bad and bold against the Ways of God It is not necessary to refer the following Narratives unto the above-mentioned Heads I shall not pretend to so much unprofitable Exactness but relate what is well attested in a promiscuous way About the Year 1674 about twenty five Persons Men and Women were indicted for a Rout or Riot in Stafford-shire that is to say for a Meeting for Religious Exercise The Prosecutors were Thomas Ward Bayliff to the Lord Stafford executed for Treason and the Popish Plot and five more whereof one died immediatly others lost their Places and others came to Poverty One Holmes an Informer hunting to find out Mr. Bakewell's Meeting in the Night fell into a Pit of Water and was in danger to be drowned had not some helped him out which Danger did operate upon him so as to say that he would go no more upon that account And Mr. S. Minister of B. met Mr. Bakewell and professed he was sorry for any thing he either said or did against him to bring him into Trouble It is observed That those who became Enemies to Mr. Bakewell of Burton had been Professors of Piety but fell from it and they fell into great and apparent Decays of Estates even to Poverty Note Most commonly they who never made a shew of Piety or fell from it trke the way of Informing Godliness is gainful and hath the Promise of the Life that now is but Ungodliness hath the contrary Curses I will confirm this Observation with a fearful Example of Apostacy and Wickedness most remarkably punished with Ruine of a good Estate and a most miserable shameful Death The Narrative was communicated to me by a
be blessed unto them that is aimed at Who can say he was ever the better or the richer for the many great Losses of the Sufferers It were happy for the Informers if no worse should befall them in this World not to speak of the World to come than happened to two of them who went to complain or demand or both their Moyety of a Justice of Peace who commanded them both to be set in the Stock Some Instances of the temporal State of these kind of Men are given in the few following Narratives Observe the Methods and Manner of the Execution and the vast Dissimilitude between their observing the Sabbath-Day and the hunted Dissenters I do heartily wish all Things were done decently and in order in the Pbulick Assemblies and that thither might be the Way of all God's People with one consent But if that cannot be without Controversy to worship God in Christ by one Spirit to preach one Faith to join in Praises to celebrate Sacraments are more like the Sanctification of the Name and Sabbaths of the Lord our God than riding and running up and down with vain Words Blastings Threatnings and Oaths in a Morning to find out a Preacher and the Afternoon in Excess and Riot I remember that Musculus said The Papists were unfit Men to correct the Anabaptists Correctionis non est opus nisi verorum Christianorum As he saith Papists may burn them but cannot correct them except Burning be Correction So these Men may inform distrain buy and sell the distrained Goods and hale Nonconformists to Prison but is this to convince and reduce them And tho others may have better Aims and Intentions than these Inferiors have yet is there not a more excellent Way especially in such a Time as this and in such a Matter wherein so much of the Glory of our Lord Jesus is concerned Let us fear that to prosecute such Men and Differences as intolerable do not bring upon us that which is really so I have used some Means to inform my self and cannot find that there is one Sign of God's Approbation of such a Course as this is I have given a small Handfull of Instances in the following Collection from which much may be observed and it is but a very little not so much as a Gleaning would be if all were written which might be I have seen it under the Hand of a Reverend Divine that it was the Conjecture of several Ministers that if the History of the Sufferings of the Nonconformists were written but in the West of England it would make a great Folio O how much more necessary a Duty lies upon Men of turning to the Lord from all their wicked Ways of working out their own Salvation and furthering the Salvation of one another of following after Love Righteousness and Peace and Preparation for the black Day of Death and the great Day of Judgment and to be more strict against open Sins than controverted and tolerable Distinctions But if they who are born after the Flesh will shew their Natures and grow wanton in Peace and Plenty and find none to insult upon in their wanton Raptures but those that desire to know and worship God in Fear Let all those who are born from above and are Partakers of the Divine Nature as the Elect of God holy and beloved put on Bowels of Mercies Kindness Humbleness of Mind Meekness Long-suffering forbearing one another And if any Man have a Quarrel against any even as Christ forgave you so also do ye And above all these things put on Charity which is the Bond of Perfectness And if other Places will not afford Rest and Quietness for peaceable and honest good Men that differ in a few Things let not London forget their Labours who ventured their Lives with other good Men to save and to make Intercessions for them in the dreadful Plague nor them who lay in the Dust pouring out Prayers for them when Ruines lay instead of stately Piles who have been eminently serviceable to reclaim dissolute Youth and promote Piety and Goodness And why may not good Men of different Notions and Persuasions in Modes and Forms live together in Peace and Love converse with mutual Confidence and Dearness as well as trade and maintain Commerce with Persons and Nations of a contrary Religion But I must conclude The Lord prosper what I have in much Sincerity endeavoured for the Glory of God and his Truth the Honour of the King and the Peace and Tranquillity of the Kingdom Amen THE Conformist's fourth Plea FOR THE Nonconformists UNION is that which all wise good and gracious Souls must needs desire and endeavour to attain as they endeavour the attainment of Happiness which consisteth in it Our Divisions are extreme painful and uncomfortable a great Dishonour and Impediment to Religion and Communion of Saints Every Motion and Proposal for it deserves Attention and Thanks tho it cannot be embraced or assented to And whatsoever tends to make continue and widen our Divisions should conscienciously be avoided Rigorous execting of abateable Articles and Terms Prejudices Suspicions straining of Consequences aggravating Offences odious Representations of Persons Strangeness refusing to do Offices of Kindness Justice and Mercy disingenuous Censures provoking Speeches and Bitterness are Wedges of Division besides other wounding and cutting warlike Instruments and Proceedings of Ecclesiastical Hostility As it was from Hardness of Heart that the Jews put away their Wives for every cause so it proceeds not from Tenderness of Heart that our Brethren are put away as incurable Schismaticks for every Dissent and Disagreement Peace Love and Forbearance have a greater Place assigned them in Religion than the Things in Controversy which cause our Division And whether it be meetest for the greater Things to suffer by the lesser or the lesser to give place to the greater let common Reason judg and common Experience come in as Evidence especially in a time when we see Religion wounded in Head and Heart and it can never recover Health Strength and Beauty as long as these Wounds lie open Unite we must or continue in this disjointed broken Condition and grow worse and worse by the application of Force and Warrants The evil Consequences of this Course are many and great 1. The Law of Love and Dearness is violated 2. The Dissenters in their Judgment will never want a sufficient Cause to justify both their Dissent and their Sufferings and the better the Cause of their Sufferings appears to be the more to blame will they be ever thought by whom they suffer 3. The ambitions and factious Politician will serve and advance his private Design by siding with either of the discontented Parties and the Vices of the Politician shall be laid on the Head of Sacred Religion 4. Others will sacrifice the Peaceable and Innocent with their Freedom and Estates to their own Avarice and devouring Lusts under a pretence of executing Laws and serving the Publick Good and
Affectation in them Affectation of what of Fines Losses Frowns Threatnings Diminution of Civil Privileges as far as some can deprive them If this be their Hypocrisy verily they have their Reward They go to hear them for Scruples and Fanaticism Let a Divine repent of such a meditated Calumny and Aspersion lest he fall into them So the Heathen objected Sed non ideo bonum quia multos convertit Quid hoc mati est cujus reus gaudet c. Tertull. Apol. chap. 1. Whatever another intends to do that dares to make the Success of their Ministry of the Gospel the Power of God to Salvation upon rational Souls to lead Christian Lives no greater Argument of divine Approbation than the spreading of Mahumetanism and the Success of the Alcoran if he never found the Efficacy of Grace of the Spirit Word and Sacraments upon his Heart let him turn his Thoughts and his Time if not his Pen to make ready for his Judgment and to secure his Peace rather than to rake into Sores and Ulcers and keep them open to get Money as some Beggars do their Sores Consid IX A safe and speedy Union of Diffenters as nearly united as possibly can be made is most desireable that there may be a happy End put to their many Sufferings Religion and Humanity can take no pleasure in the deserved Punishments of Men the Murmurs and Complaints of Sufferers stir and move Compassions and Pity holds the Hand even of Justice in all Cases in which Necessity is not urgent and manifest The Evil of Separation hath been opened when the Evil of their Sufferings hath not been touched upon They are urged with the first but that is but one Side of the Evil let us search into the other Sore to take the whole Weight and Compass of the Mischief that lies upon the Protestant Religion and both run down from the same Cause and he that would stop the Current of Evil in divided Streams and dry up the Flood of Afflictions and Miseries must stop it at the Well head of the Cause They are urged to enter into the Communion of the Church as by Law established because of the Mischiefs of their Separations and it would be a special Service to move our Governors to make their Return as easy as may be by opening the Scandal of their Sufferings If their Consent to our Injunctions were gained the Controversy would be at an end and this Prosecution also But that being not like to be attained this way the Continuance of the Separation is more for the good and profit of the Church than their Sufferings for while they enjoy their Liberty the Gospel is preached and they that are regenerate and called and gathered to Christ are gathered to the Catholick Church tho not united unto a particular Church in some certain Bonds of external Communion But if they were totally suppressed and where they are most narrowly watched and kept in thousands of Souls would lose the Benefit of their Labours and their Hearts are like to be more estranged from us and the Church will still lose the Content and Comfort of their Communion The supposed and aggravated Sin and Evil of the Separation is doubled by their Sufferings and made more incurable by the Exasperation We see and taste the Fruit of above twenty Years Proceedings and better cannot be expected but much worse may be feared To argue for a Release from their Sufferings because they have suffered deeply may seem weak and inconsequent but take them in a Complex of Causes and Circumstances and I do hope the Argument may prove a Matter of Consideration to them that are concerned in these great Matters If a Man should move for a Suspension of the Laws against Malefactors thus Millions have suffered Imprisonment and Death and therefore spare them the Argument is not only ridiculous and weak but weak and sinful because they are Malefactors and the Laws of God both natural and revealed require it and there would be no Safety to the Lives of Innocents nor of Civil Rights and Possessions But to argue Our dissenting Brethren have suffered much therefore forbear to inflict more Punishments upon them is not without some Strength and convincive Evidence 1. The performance of Religious Exercises in a different Form is no such Offence and Crime as deserves to be punished before the Penal Laws decree the Penalties The Difference of the Administrations is made by the diverse using or disusing of Things indifferent some extending their Liberty further than others To use Christian Liberty wisely and as much as may be inoffensively is no punishable Crime but a Duty and if there be not a Liberty in indifferent Things there is none at all 2. But if it were a Matter punishable yet of such Things as are punishable before a Penal Law be made Sed non ideo sequitur eam paenam debere exigi quia boc pendet ex connexione finium ob ques poena instituta est cum ipsa poenâ as Grotius writes De Jure Bell. Pac. lib. 2. cap 4. § 22. Now what can be the Ends of these Penal Constitutions 1. Unity of Mind with our Governors in those Things enjoined that seems to be the Reason of the Assent and Consent which none can be of but such as were so minded before it was required all Reasons and Circumstances perpensed But that all should be of the same mind is impossible in our State That 's an End not attainable and they who propose it propose only for themselves and them of the same Judgment with them and exclude the rest whom the Lord hath received It was a wise and is a celebrated Saying of the Emperor Maximilian the Second to Augustus of Saxe when he interposed for Peueer in the Vbiquitarian Controversies and Persecution The Duke told him he would have all his Ministers agree with him and among one another to which the Emperor answered Ego in negotiis ad fidem conscientiam pertinentibus nec ausim vel velim cuiquam offerre necessitatem aliquam coactione Scis irrito conatu c. I know that will be lost Labour and that it is grievous and dangerous in it self Id nunquam perficies inquit Imperator neque nostrum est imperare Conscientiis an t ad fidem quimque vi cogere Perclius Histor Carcerum p. 361. Hoornbeck Summa Controv. cum Lutheranis p. 657. 2. The Peace of the Church and State may be aim'd at Can there be Peace in the House of God whilst one Fellow-Servant smites another Surely that is not the way to Peace Which brings to my mind that of the Learned Hornbeck Oratione de Ecclesiarum inter se Communiene If we shall receive or treat them otherwise than Brethren whom Christ doth not disdain or think unworthy of so great a Name Place and Honour Atque hoe Christianae charitatis communionisque est fundamentum This is the Foundation also of all Christian and Ecclesiastical Love
Head respecting the several Parties named 1. The Prasbyterian to called doth not insist upon that Form of Government He offers to come in 2. The chief of the Congregational are Men of great Worth Learning Sobriety and Holiness and they are but few and never like to be many in the Countries and but few in Cities and populous Flaees 3. The Anabaptist is an Independent in Government for ought I know what will do the one good will do the other in that point And these are either simply scrupulous in the Point of Baptism or else compounded of other Notions The first sort are reputed peaceable and holy Men by them that write against them as Mr. Baxter Mr. Obed Wills and Mr. Joseph Whiston The second may be kept in Order and Quiet as easily as our careless ignorant and debauched Sects that go under another Name 4. The Antamenian as such is a Doctrinal Dissenter yet thinks in the point of Imputation he is the Antipapist and the Protestant and falls in among others in point of Church-Discipline 5. The Millenarian is either notionally so and then his Faith is to himself 〈◊〉 anti-magistratically and so he is to be watched and coerced and Presbyterians and Independents will help Lastly The Quaker must have the Right of Humanity The Honour of all good Men Sir Matthew Halt determined their Right in the Point of Marriage My Soul grieves for them Some of them that I know are a sort of Christians they do not give enough to the Scriptures which as fat as I know is their great Error from whence the rest proceed Their spiritual Loss to me soems vast They are gone far from us indeed but I wish it were considered that some Magistrates in their extreme Heats and Violences did urge them with Oaths when there was no cause for it and picking quarrels with their Scruples they fell to a hasty and violent Execution of their own violent Passions more than the Law They who scrupled swearing did call God to Witness and did protest and promise Loyalty and Obedience but it was not accepted they offered the Security of their Words and their Bodies to the Law when found Transgressors against the Peace But they were hurried and crouded into Prisons and ill used in many Prisons and so became hardned and at length modell'd into an exact Policy Yet they are Men and Natives and whether Men shall forfeit their Goods and Liberties for a Dissent in Religion by any Gospel-Rule or Rules of Christian Equity is a great Question and the Negative past doubt as yet If they have a natural Right to Marriage and those ontracts stand tho not made after the Liturgy they have a natural Right to Society among us and our Rule is To walk honestly towards them as they that are without There are many Things commendable in them These are the noted Sects looked upon with an evil eye as dangerous Men and yet there are other Sects very pernicions but what Course is taken with them Are there not Hobbists and Atheists were there ever more of these since the Reformation than now Witness the great Numbers of Sermons preached and printed the great Numbers of Tracts the large Volumes of Sir Matthew Hale and others against Atheism Are these multiplied without cause if not there is a great encease of Atheism What shall be done with the Sects of Insidels Blasphemers God dammens Drunkards Gamesters Who amongers and their Meeting Houses Irregular Men without Callings Pamphleting Clubs Paper Indendiaties and the Society of Beggars and Vagrants that are of no Church What do you call those Places where many of our Nobility and Gentry either learned or were confirmed in their Levity Vanity and are so tainted with a sort of Wit and Words that makes the Word of Christ and of Wisdom upsavoury and mean where many have learned the Gifts of Considence and Immoralities where Swords have been drawn and Blood shed but never indicted for Riots Where have Persons learned to put off God and Conscience and Counsels with wiety Answers to excuse their long lying in Bed till Prayers and Sermons and Sacraments are over or their long dressing till Dinner to make their Afternoon-Visits before to the Idols or Images like themselves Who can reckon all the Sects that dissent from Christ's Gospel from their Baptismal Vows that say they are for the Publick tho they rarely visit them for the Religion established by Law with a secret Reservation except what requires them to be pure and holy O the low Estate of Christian Religion even among them that have the general Name of it May it never fare worse with Persons and Places for Religious Exercises than with most of these who perhaps never had more than a private Reproof and they will be sparing of Complaints And now I turn in from this Digression to give a few Narratives of the Nonconformists Sufferings in which it will plainly appear 1. Perhaps no Law was ever executed with more Violence and Partiality or Proceedings with less Success and more Mistakes and Errors in Proceedings more arbitrarily and illegally than those against Dissenting Protestants 2. It is no wonder they have been so unsuccessful to bring them in if you respect both Persons and Methods unlike to effect that End 3. How it concerns all Men according to their Places and Power to petition a Cessation of these Proceedings 1. To put an end to the gross Wickedness of many Instruments who take occasion from the Laws to exercise their Irreligion and Wickedness 2. To prevent further Judgments upon many particular Families and Persons and the provoking of Christ to take away his Gospel from us when many of his Servants are so ill used and his Ordinances blasphemed and Wickedness committed 4. The various Appearances of God both in Judgment and Mercy in this very Proceeding 5. Let it be judged and resolved soberly whether this way be not a greater Scandal to the Protestant Religion than the Separation is as great as it is 6. Those who are glad of the Law have no cause to think the very Law it self of any great use to their Design provided 1. They proceed against the Nonconformists strictly according to the Scope of the Law 2. According to the Direction of it as to Proofs and Conviction And if Men did not go beyond it they could never have done what they have done 7. It will be manifest that they are not punished for Sedition Rebellion or any Crime of that Infamy and Note by the various kinds of Prosecutions and Punishments 8. Some are punished in several Courts and several ways 9. How the Adversaries of the Nonconformists have been defeated of their Purposes some brought to Ruine and miserable Ends some penitent and converted and all or most frustrated of their Designs 10. How grosly many have acted against all Humanity and Law against God against that Reverence which is due to the King and his own Act. And many other Things will occur in
often imprisoned brought like a Traytor to hold up his Hand which he had often lifted up to God in Prayer for the King the Court guarded with Troopers and not the Sheriffs Men his Friends and Comforters were not permitted to stand by him the Indictments found against better Evidence of better Auditors even four that wrote Sermon-Notes against the common Sense of a Jury made And after all this loyal Traitor for before the Trial and in it his Words were said to amount to Treason is only Fined committed till it be paid and after three Months the Fine remitted And this formidable Trial was on part of the high Day May 29. in which one that had prevailed with God to see it more than all his Adversaries had no matter of Joy lest him upon it but the rejoycing of his own Conscience This brings to my mind how touchy and captious many Men were at Preachers and Sermons in those Days of which I could give several Instances in but one eminent Conforming Minister who suffered very much by quarrelsom and injudicious Hearers About the same time many eminent and good Ministers were brought into Trouble and Prisons and 't is not unlikely but the Judg might mean the Presbyterians in Worcestershire of which an Account is printed and abridged by Mr. Care 2d Part of the History of the Popish Plots Was it like that any thing of Accommodation or Union of our woful Breaches could ensue such Proceedings Is the Suspicion groundless that there was a Design to keep out such Men as these And that Politicians made great use of these Mock-Plots to give colour to their Designs which afterwards they formed And some thought themselves never well in unless some others might be ejected Nonconformity was a Crime in Mr. P. before our Act of Uniformity came out and whilst the King's Declaration only commended the Use of the old Common-Prayer-Book as far as Men could go and declared no Man should be punished for Non-conformity Mr. John Whitlock Vicar of St. Mary's in Nottingham after the King's Declaration about Ecclesiastical Affairs came forth and before the Act of Uniformity took place was indicted at the Sessions in Nottingham for not reading Common-Prayer July 2. He was cited into the Ecclesiastical Court and in case he should refuse to read Common-Prayer in the Surplice in that Parish-Church he should be suspended within the Archdeaconry of Nottingham and his Church to be sequestred Mr. John Barret was suspended the same time and July 7. the Order of the Court passed for the publication of their Suspension for not obeying the Monition of the Court. Upon the same day there was an Order of the Court for sequestring the Profits with this Expression Gum jam legitime vacat Curato caret Note This was before the Suspension was published and denounced and whilst the King's Declaration promised Indemonity In the same manner was Mr. Jo. Barret indicted suspended and his Church St. Peter's in Nottingham sequestred and he forced to leave his Free hold in which he lived July 26 1662. Mr. William Reynolds Lecturer of St. Mary's is Nottingham was peremptorily inhibited Preaching and receiving any Prefits and to appear at the Consistory-Court at York August 8. following at which time no Articles were produced against him yet he was suspended and referred to the Visitation Septem 9. following at which he appeared and received these Articles 1. No Man by the Laws and Constitutions of this Realm is to preach and administer the Sacraments unless Episcopally erdained 2. Notwithstanding which he hath so done in the Parish of St. Mary Nottingham 3. About July he was inhibited Preaching in St. Mary's and in any other Place in the Diocess of York which was not in the Inhibition and about August was suspended 4. Yet once or more he had preached there which was not true He resused to give his Answer under his Hand because the Articles infringed he Act of Indemnity for which he was admonished three times immediately one after another and then excommunicated by Dr. Burwell Chancellor of York and Septemb. 15. issued out his Order for the publication of it propter ipsius manifestam contumatiam in non exhibendo responsa articulis Hearing of a purpose to take out the Writ De Excommun capiend he was necessitated to go to London and upon suggestion in the Court of Common-Pleas of the Violation of the Act of Indemnity the Lord Chief-Justice Bridgman and the other Judges granted him an Order Hilar. 14. In Easter Term following he was constrained to London and to stay there the whole Term to see if Dr. B. would show Cause but he never appeared and so Mr. R. heard no more of it tho it was not taken off till the last Act of Indemnity All which was a great Charge to Mr. Reynolds It is well known what Endeavours were used to remove the Reverend and Learned Dr. Tuckney from his Professorship of Divinity and Mastership of St. John's in Cambridg betimes Anno 1660 before he came to the Trial of Nonconformity by Articles which could not affect him But a gracious Letter from the King was procured and submitted to by the said Reverend Doctor a Copy of which is as followeth C. R. WHereas we are credibly informed that Dr. Anthony Tuckney Master of St. John's College and one of the Professors of Divinity in our Vniversity of Cambridg is well stricken in Years and by reason of his Age and some Infirmities of Body may not hereafter be so well able to undergo the Burthen of those two Places We out of Our Princely Care both of that Our Vniversity and the said Dr. Tuckney do judge it meet that he the said Dr. T. before the end of this instant June do recede from the aforesaid Mastership and Professors Place with the Rectory of Summersham annexed thereunto by the Grace and Favour of Our Royal Grandfather Which Signification of Our said Pleasure if the said Dr. T. shall submit unto We shall be so well-pleased with that his Submission that We shall graciously accept thereof and will be ready to remember it for his Good upon any just occasion And further taking into Our Princely Consideration the great Pains and Diligence of the said Doctor in the discharge of the said Professors Place without that Benefit which should have been received by him from the said Rectory of Summersham which during the late unhappy and rapacious Times was unjustly detained from him upon that his Submission Our Will and Pleasure is and We do hereby order That whatsoever Persons during the natural Life of the said Dr. T. shall after his Cession be elected or promoted to the said Professors Place shall before their respective Admissions thereunto give sufficient Assurance in Law to the said Dr. T. for the Yearly Payment of 100 l. out of the Rectory of Summersham to the said Dr. T. for the Reward of his former Pains by even and equal Portions at four usual Feasts of the
to eat and most remarkably visited in his Family His Brother Informer J. H. about two Years after the Act against Conventicles came out threw up the Trade as unprofitable and since he became an Auditor of Mr. M. C. And one time this J. H. was informed of by new Informers as being present at a Meeting there and was fined 5 s. He was a very serious and devout Hearer After Sir John Hartopp was chosen Knight for Leicester-shire against a great Opposition they who voted for him were called Hartopians and a Revenge was contrived upon the Protestant Dissenters of H. To that end one J W was made Constable who indicted them all not one spared upon the Statute of Twenty Pounds per Month which Fines amount to so great a Sum that understanding Persons compute if the whole Town of Harborough were to be sold for ready Money one Moiety of the Purchase would not discharge the Fines In Decemb. 1679 this Jo. W was thrown into Northampton-Goal and tho none came in against him at the Assizes the Judg saw sufficient cause to continue him in Prison but upon great Sollicitation he was bailed till the Summer-Assizes Within three Weeks after his coming home to Harborough he took upon him to be Informer for the King At the Summer-Assizes he appeared to save his Bail and to receive a Sentence of Condemnation as it proved from Judg Ellis and Monday following was appointed for Execution but it was by some means not publickly known procured he might be respited till Thursday following at which time there was a vast Confluence of People come together from the Town and Country a great way about who knew him to be a grand Malefactor to see Execution But in the Nick of Time a Reprieve came down as some have said without the King's Knowledg So little abash'd was he at the Sentence of Death that within an hour after he committed his common Sin in the Goal as was reported upon good Credit And on the expected Execution-Day he made himself merry at the great Concourse that came to the sight of it But after this he came home again and made great Brags that the Fanaticks should repay his Charges of procuring Reprieves and other Charges which cost some hundreds reckoning his Moiety would come to Four Hundred Pounds But as he could not leave the pursuit of his evil Deeds so the Justice of God pursued him and took him for Horse-stealing Coining c. and Vengeance fell upon him at Wisbich where he was after many Escapes once again condemned and executed There is a Successor of his near the same place and three of his perjured Hirelings who take no warning as yet and may in time become Examples to them that take no warning They can to appearance as freely forswear themselves as they can speak being hardned in Sin and sensless of Hell and having Countenance dare shew their Faces At East-Salcomb in Devon there dwelt one Joan Baston a Widow aged and blind who for a supposed Conventicle kept at her House Anno 1673 was fined Twelve Pounds and for non-payment of it was threatned with a Goal After some Weeks the Officers came and broke open her Doors and carried away much Goods above the value terrifying her over and over with the Goal and as was conceived labouring to extort dangerous Words from her They sold as many Goods as were worth thirteen Pound for Fifty Shillings six Hogsheads valued at Forty Sihllings for nine Shillings and Pewter Feather-Beds c. for Twenty Shillings and demanded of her Tenants her Rent by which means she suffered much This is signed by J. B. and the Story related by another hand and sufficiently attested The Constable having seized J. Baston's Goods told me We have been up and down about our Office seizing the old Woman's Goods This is the Fruit of your Rebellion And as for Mr. Geo. Cawley the Preacher he hath spoken Treason To whom I replied No Sir I hope not Yes said he and if he do not die I will die for him Sir managed that false Accusation against him from which he was cleared at the Assizes The Constable that falsly accused Mr. Coles of S. was taken ill at Exeter and continued ill a Night and a Day On Friday he endeavoured to go homewards with his Neighbours In his Journey a wild Duck flew over his Head and backward and forward at which his Horse made a stop and would not go forward His Company demanded the reason of his Stand he replied he could not go further I see a Fire befere me A while after he went on but the same Fire followed him to and fro all the way homeward After his coming home he fancied Thieves to be about his House attempting to break open the Doors he heard such a Sound and Noise he sent down his Servant-Maid to see who found all fast and quiet She having lighted a Candle he cried out There are some coming up Stairs with great Lights c. Thus he continued till Lord's-Day at Night and about two or three in the Morning died sensless of his Condition Thus it proved true Mr. C. should die or he die for him he died but not for Mr. C. The Constable and Assistants that ransacked the old Widow's House brought forth the Pulpit into the High-Way with half a Hogshead of Sider and therewith a Company of base Fellows drank Healths in the Pulpit and when they had done brake the Pulpit in pieces Edw. Warden's Bible was distrained for his Fine of Three Shillings when other Goods were refused See the Piety of some of our Suppressors of Conventicles Preachers are threatned with Hanging and the Death of Traytors they pull down a Pulpit to set up Healthing in it tear the Pulpit distrain and sell the Bible to choose when they might have choice of other Goods Novemb. 1670 an Information was taken by J. T. Esq and given by certain lewd Fellows against some near Cruse Morchard in Devon The Informers were John Partridg that went always armed for fear of Bayliffs Chr. Short and Jo. Short These lay lurking about the House of Tho. Melshurst suspecting a Meeting Soon after they gave out there had been Praying or Preaching or Expounding there but which they could not tell because they were kept off from the House by a great Bull-Dog which was shortly after poysoned The Justice took a general information whether upon Oath or not is not said and sent out his Warrants to bring certain Persons before him one of which understanding the Informers were in the House desired the Justice to call them and asked the Informers how they could tell there was Praying or Preaching or Expounding and desired to know which was done seeing by their own Confession they were kept off by the Dog The Justice perceiving them to be at a loss for an Answer made Answer for them They might know well enough which it was by the Tone and upon that convicted them and among the
but against his Honour Wealth and Strength Why will Magistrates employ set on and encourage infamous and known lying Fellows How can they believe them that were not Witnesses nor present in the Meeting from the beginning to the end but lay skulking at a distance that went scouting up and down that took Names upon Trust and Hear-say and that cannot tell the Text nor one Sentence of the Sermon nor who the Preacher was Here Regard is to be had to the Credibility of Persons on both sides Are there not as honest just consciencious Persons as Informers I hope I know there are why may not they be believed and the Parties relieved upon their Appeals Is it a sufficient Reason because they swear for the King If for the King as a Party then Judges judg between Party and Party and in doing Justice against the King's Cause as a Party they establish his Throne as a King and thereby act for him If it be for the King's Profit it supposes the Right to lie on his Side first or else it is no Profit but a Worm in his Exchequer What other Reason is there why these Witnesses must be believed Is it because they swear positively in the Affirmative Because some that construe Things in their favour do take this for a Rule that a Negative cannot be proved therefore their positive Swearing cannot be disproved I do think it worthy a few Words to explain it which may help Mens Understanding therefore I say A Negative cannot be proved because it is grounded pardon the Word upon a Non-entity that is There is no such thing therefore such a thing cannot be affirmed and proved Truth is the positive in Being and Reality and therefore Truth can only be affirmed In a Contradictory one Side can only be true If one Man swear a Lie never so positively he positively swears a Negative or a Privative He that swears the Truth tho it be contrary to an affirmative Falshood or Lie swears a Positive Now when an Informer or any other Witness swears positively so and so and another swears the contrary the Judg and Jury who are Judges of Evidence must know that he that swears Truth he only swears the Positive and the other the Negative and therefore in this case they must use their Reason to compare the Credit of the Persons that swear on both Sides and if there be an equality in them they must have regard to Circumstances and find out what Evidence they can Let Juries take heed of the Guilt of a false Verdict when they are tempted and deceived that it is for the King They are to proceed according to the Credit of the Evidence and then it is for the King when they proceed according to Truth Then you are Loya Subjects when you act according to Law for Law is the Rule of Loyalty It is too apparent that too many now do study by what Laws Protestants may be brought into Trouble as Lactantius reports that Domitius Vlpianus de Officio Proconsulis lib. 7. rescripta nefaria collegit ut docere quibus paenis affici oporteret eos qui se cultores Dei confiterentur De Justitia lib. 5. p. 491. Honoured Sirs you have a Law and Laws keep strictly to them and do not your selves transgress them You have Laws against others keep to those Laws and you will not give Dissenters such just cause to complain as they have You have Laws and you have a Religion too in great danger from the Execution of them at this time and in the usual manner if the Judgment of a great part of them who had Ability to judg and Power to declare their Judgments be of any value You have a Law but keep to your Places lest you give great advantage to them that complain of illegal Sufferings Many of you do not like the Laws but besides the Law there is a Penalty and an hundred Pounds will make a Hole in some Justices Estates especially in Towns and Cities who are Tradesmen But keep strictly to the Laws to these Laws and you may venture your Penalty If you were not too forward or too fearful the Informers would fear to come to your Houses as Men afraid to be sent to the House of Correction or a Goal and you may easier defeat them than they recover a Forfeiture upon you with all their Arts of Falshood and Perjury But if you value your Forfeiture above the preservation of the Protestant Religion in a great part of it how will you be able co suffer the Loss of all against Popery And lastly Consider seriously the manifold Manifestations of God in these Things The Judgments of God are rarely and seldom executed because of his Patience and Mercy but they are sometimes that they may be noted and that Men may fear The Lord is known by the Judgments which he executeth This may be called Fanaticisin and vain Observations of weak and superstitious Minds But as it is a Contempt of God not to observe his Providences and his Judgments so Christians in all Ages have made and given Observations of God's Hand stretched out against them that have persecuted his People or helped forward their Affliction You know how unwillingly Pontius Pilate was drawn to deliver our Saviour Who ever accounted Ger. Jo. Vossius below the most learned of his Age He gives this Censure of Pilate's Act Harmon Evang. l. 2 c. 5 p. 246. Cujus injustitiae graves à Deo poenas luit For he who suffered himself to be carried with the Accusations of the Jews which he knew to be false so far as to adjudg innocent Christ to Punishment he also himself circumvented with the false Accusations of the Jews was banished to Vienna as Josephus Lib. 18. of his Antiq. c. 7. Neither did Herod escape unpunished who professed he found nothing worthy of Death in Christ for his cruel handling of him for he was tho for a far different Cause by Caligula banished unto Lions Joseph Antiq. l. 18. c. 25. This might be sufficient to discourage any from being forward or inciting and promoting this Work either by Threats or Promises and to make the unwilling resolute in their Averseness and Forbearance He that said Remember Lot ' s Wife doth expect that all Men should read what God's hand writes upon Examples and declares by his Publick Judgments Tertullian observes to Scapula the Publick Judgments of God for the Persecution of the Christians such as not gathering their Harvests the former Years Rain and the Fires which hung over the City of Carthage all the Night they knew what they threatned who saw them and what the Thunders sounded Nec unquam impiorum scelere in nostrum nomen exurgitur ut noâ—statim divinitùs vindicta comitetur c. Cyprianus contra Demetrianum Omnia haec sunt imminentis â—â—ae Dei signa These are all Signs of the Wrath of God hanging over our Heads And they shall feel the universal and last or
Year i.e. at the Nativity of our Lord and Saviour at the Annunciation of the B. Virgin the Birth of St. John Baptist and the Feast of Michael the Archangel during the Continuance of the said Professors and the natural Life of the said Dr. T. any Grant or Statute to the contrary notwithstanding Given at our Court at Whitehall June 1. 1661. By his Majesty's Command EDW. NICHOLAS The Doctor received the 100 l. per an many Years from his Successor in both his Places Dr. Gunning the now Lord Bishop of Ely Some went another way to work against some eminent and peaceable Men in Oxford as is to be seen in a forged Letter sent to Mr. Martin the Town-Clerk upon which some of the Militia-Troops came to suppress or prevent a Plot made and laid by some more skilful in that Art than the Reverend Persons named to be in it See Care 's 2d Part of the History of the Popish Plot. Before the Act of Uniformity came out twenty of the Auditors of two sober Ministers who preached at Beaston-Church in Nottingham shire were indicted for a Conventicle Mr. Oliver Heywood Minister of Coley near Hallifax was prosecuted in the Consistory at York for not reading Common-Prayer a whole Year before the Act of Uniformity commenced and whilst his Majesty's Declaration granted an Indulgence was suspended June 29. 1662. and excommunicated and could not by any Intercession be absolved by Dr. B. unless he would take an Oath parendo juri stando mandatis Ecclesia And going to hear Sermons at Hallifax Dr. H. desired him to forbear being an Excommunicate and at Coley one made an Attempt to thrust him out of Church for the same reason and Twelve-pence a Sunday was demanded of him for not coming to Church during this Exclusion And at length a Writ came out but the Bayliff who was to serve it favoured him so much as to smother it and so he escaped the Prison Many that were strongly inclined to Unity and Peace and forbore to conform as far as they could in hopes of reforming some Things and leaving Things most scrupled at least indifferent were urged by violent Persons with Conformity before the new Law was made and strange Informations and Reports were raised against worthy Men and occasion taken from their scrupling some Things to represent them as unpeaceable and unfit for Union and as if they were hatching new Mischiefs which their Souls abhorred stricter Laws must be made on purpose not as it proved for the Publick Good but private Turns We may not forget who were very forward in suppressing Lectures and dissolving those Combinations which had for many Years preserved the Truths of God fresh in the Minds of Multitudes of People which otherwise had been lost or in danger in unsetled Times kept Ministers to their Studies Love and Acquaintance among them and were managed without offence or hindrance to our National Settlement Some of the Suppressors were Gentlemen in Power and meer Tools in other Mens hands and these listned to false Reports of Whisperers and Tale-bearers or else they were Persons of ungodly Lives such as prosecuted Mr. Parsons ignorant and debauched Persons that served their Lusts Two such were Enemies to the Reverend Mr. Barret at Nottingham One presented the Book of Common-Prayer to him a Whoremonger cast out or the Town-Council leaving his own Wife to work for her Living or shift as she could for her self he took another Man's Wife away with him a great way off and kept her several Years Another Person who was to testify that the Book was tendred to him was an Atturney who afterwards stirred an Adversary of the said Mr. Barret to put a forged Bond of 400 l. for Non-payment of 200 l. in Suit against him And that Mr. Barret might not have Remedy in Chancery he was presented in the spiritual Court where it had soon come to an Excommunication had he not removed out of the Diocess into Litchfield Diocess And that Atturney when the Commissioners sate upon the matter of the Bond feared to come out of Doors being then in Debt tho a landed Man and likely to have flourished in the World These and such as these were the forward Men to bring good Men into Trouble and were sooner heard than better Men till they became discovered It is clear that Nonconformity was not the only Cause of our Breaches and Miseries but a Spirit of Division from God and Disaffection to his Servants and Peace with Godliness Mr. Bennet of Whitweek in Leicestershire gives this Account under his hand among many other Troubles There came Letters from the Duke of N. C. relating a Plot in York-shire to the Deputy-Lieutenants in Leicestershire whereupon the Lord and other Deputies sent the Constable to fetch Mr. B. before them and told him they conceived it necessary to secure him as suspected of the Plot. He told them His Lordship was the first Man he heard speak of the Plot and being Treason I must said he and I will reveal it I know nothing but what I have from you and I must make it known His Lordship drew out Letters and Papers which he said were from the D. of N. and other Lords to shew him but he said he would see no Papers which did concern any Plot. The next day he went to the Earl of Stamford and discovered what he heard from the Lord who discovered it to other Deputy-Lieutenants and so Mr. Bennet escaped that Snare Upon such Informations against the Ejected Party it is like the King and Council sent down Letters to demand Security of the Peace from such Persons as they suspected Upon which pretence Mr. Bennet was with other Ministers taken and clapt in Prison at Leicester but they were after a Time released Among whom was Dr. Hen. Wilkinson of Magdalen-Hall in Oxen a Person of that great Openness and 〈◊〉 of Heart that no Man can believe him a Party in any ill Designs 〈◊〉 when the rest were released he was detained a while upon pretence of keeping a Conventicle with his Fellow-Prisoners to whom he preached one Lord's-Day in the Prison After the Act of Uniformity took place it is impossible to relate the Number of their Sufferings and great Trials with Hardships upon their Persons Estates and Families by uncomfortable Separations Dispersions Unsettlement and Removes Disgraces Reproaches Imprisonments chargeable Journeys Expences in Law tedious Sicknesses and uncurable Diseases ending in Death great Disquietments and Frights to their Wives and Families and their doleful Effects upon them and in all Conditions various Appearances of Divine Providence great Supports various Deliverances and strong Resolutions with a clear satisfaction of Conscience as to the Cause of their Sufferings are impartially to be observed How various are the degreees of Light and the Dictates of Conscience even in good wise and self-searching Men and that even in a division of Judgment and Practice The first Cause is different degrees of Light and means of