an accepted time a day of Salvation You were worse scar'd than hurt with the Alarm of a King Such is not the manner of the King that rules over us as is described 1 Sam. 8.9 ours is no such King Are not your Estates all but those that were ravished from the Church or State continued with you Is not the Law open and ready to defend you and yours if required as much as any other of the Kings Subjects If you be as quiet may you not live as quietly as any people in England To allude to that Text Psal 126.1 When the Lord turned again the Captivity of Zion we were like them that dream Are you not like men and women in a dream to see your selves in so good a plight and posture as you never expected to have been if God restor'd the King Had God given you a new Law of thankfulfulness upon condition it should have been so well with you as now it is would you not have accepted it with all your hearts upon those terms If God has been better to you than his word or promise your obligation is so much the greater Learn we then to bless God for our good King to love honour and obey him and let us cry out with the man after God's own heart Psal 118 28. God is the Lord which hath shewed us light bind the Sacrifice with cords even to the horns of the Altar ver 29. O give thanks to the Lord for he is good for his mercy endureth for ever Now Reader let thine own invention tell thee how these heads may be further enlarged and upon what other heads it may be most proper for thee to discourse either in publick or private upon a 30th day of January sacred to the Memory of King Charles the first his Martyrdom I will detain thee no longer than whilst I have made a little enquiry into one great Mystery and resolved one perplexing Question which is this Quest If the murthering of the late King were so great a sin as I have deciphereed it to be How comes it to pass that none of all his Judges one excepted who by common fame is presumed to be a man of more Conscience and Religion than the rest no not of those who were executed for it were ever for ought I heard learn to confess and bewail what they had done but rather to carry and brave it out with such confidence and seeming innocence as the adulterous woman Prov. 30.20 of whom Solomon thus speaks She eateth and wipeth her mouth and saith I have done no wickedness This their confidence hath cast such a mist before the eyes of some people and so perverted their judgments as to make them think there was nothing amiss in what they did yea to be almost perswaded that they did God good service in it and quitted themselves like Phineas who stood up and executed judgment and it was accounted to him for righteusness Answ But oh the mistakes of men Oh the false Glosses which dazle the eyes of poor filly mortals Oh the common fallacy which imposeth upon the world viz. Non causa pro causa They must needs have had the most false and flattering Consciences the most deceitful hearts that ever men had if ever they presum'd to tell them they had done well or bid them when taking their Viaticum or last repast to eat their bread with joy and drink their wine with a merry heart for God accepted their work or that with such a sacrifice as that God was well pleased Had an Israelite instead of sacrificing a Lamb cut off a dogs neck or offered Swines blood for an oblation to God or bless'd an Idol instead of burning incense or slain a man instead of killing of an Oxe as God expresses in Ifa 66.3 he might as well have promised himself Gods acceptance thereof and his smelling a sweet savour of rest from thence as those Murtherers of an excellent King could do of that bloody barbarous Sacrifice which they had prepared to which I may aptly apply those words of the Apostle 1 Cor. 10.10 But I say the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to Devils and not to God No drink-offering ever cheer'd the heart of Devils and wicked men so well according to Judg. 9.13 as did that of Royal Blood If ever there were mirth in Hell surely it was upon that day That was such a Hecatomb as the infernall Fiends never had a greater offered to them never a Feast of more fat things sacrificed to their malice That they who were the Actors in this bloody Tragedy were no more sensible of what they had done might spring from two causes 1. Because the sin being so great and horrid as it was might well bring a kind of Apoplexy upon their Consciences and in some such apoplectick Fit they or some of them seem'd to dye For great sins as well as great sorrows and blows are apt to stun and stupifie as I proved before 2. Because there were many of them that were concern'd in it and it might seem to them to be in this as in other cases viz. That many hands make light work 'T is a very true and common observation that when a great many men joyn together when they go as it were in herds and droves they do often venture upon doing of those things by consent which were they invited to do alone they would be ready to say as he Is thy Servant a dead dog that I should do this thing One would think men were deceived with some such idle fallacy as this viz. That if an hundred men joyn together in one Murther or other high act of Injustice or Dishonesty every one of them were but the hundredth part of a Murtherer as if multorum manibus grande levatur onus were a Rule that held in this case but as thus applied it is a very great mistake For what our Law saith is consonant to right Reason viz. That in murther no man is meer accessary but all are principals and obnoxious to death Shall I add a third This their sin was not so universally gone before to judgment as is a plain ordinary Murther because it was coloured over with a pretence of Law and Justice there were a great many that were ready not only to vindicate but applaud it the mask was not quite taken off from it nor the vail of darkness from the hearts of all the Spectators This with a good strong Cordial a sufficient opiate and a seared Conscience and an ambition to set a good face upon what they had done to make the best of a bad market to dye like men and Souldiers and those that some would not doubt to Canonize for Saints even for the sake of their Regicide could they but keep their own counsel by dying such in point of Resolution and seeming Assurance those with some other things I could name might be the true causes why they did or seem'd to die
save in a few instances here and there one c. and of them whom they censured as carnal and ungodly or but moral people at the best for that the morality of some of them did much outstrip their own has put me out of conceit with what had wont to be called The Good Old Cause more than any thing else has done And then to see that the Chieftains and greatest Bigots of and for the good old Cause as they call'd it could swallow such a Camel as was the murthering of the King yea be themselves some of the Camels that murthered him or caused him to be murthered whilst they seem'd to strain at meer Gnats could say This is the heir come let us kill him and the inheritance shall be ours Those I say are the things which have made me think cheaply of those times those men and their pretensions to suspect if not more than so a very grand cheat and a bottomless-pit of worldly interest and carnal design in and under all those things and to wish heartily that the Church and State might always continue as now it is much rather than to fall back again into the hands of such Tinker-like Reformers as were in those days making ten holes where they mended one and be re-invaded by hypocritical Vsurpation Sacriledge Enthusiasme and Confusion If I know any thing of my own heart I do at this very day sincerely love every body that I know or think to be truly good and possibly my charity is as large as most mens and my censoriousness as little but as for those who make the highest pretences to Religion and seem to be Piety-like Calomelanos as Physicians call it six or 12 times sublimed or like the Pharisees of old who said to other men Stand off I am holier than thou who rather blaze and blare like great Comets than shine like Stars in the Firmament of Religion if I find them playing the Knaves becoming the Ring-leaders of Murther embrewing their hands in Royal blood under pretence of abhorring Idols committing Sacriledge and bringing all to confusion and under colour of Reforming Church and State to design nothing but the feathering of their own Nests getting wealth and power into their own hands per fas nefas overturning overturning overturning till they themselves whose right it is not come and take all and when they have done all entitling God and Religion to all their Villanies like those with whom the great God doth thus expostulate Jer. 7.9 Will ye steal murder and commit Adultery and swear falsly and come and stand before me in this House and say we are delivered to do all these abominations c. I say the people to whom this Character is due whose Inscription this is are to my Soul as one calls it the first-born of Abominations Now after all that hath been said of the exceeding sinfulness of their bloody fact who were the Murtherers of the late King and of the woful hazard which their precious and immortal Souls did incur thereby give me leave to hope that if the same opportunities should ever come again which God forbid i. e. if ever the now dissenting people of England should have so puissant an Army at their back as then they had and so subtile skilful and resolute a General to conduct them and so many covetous people at their heels waiting to enrich themselves by the spoil of the Kings and Churches Lands so dividing the Lions skin when once he were dead from a real dread of thereby plunging themselves into everlasting flames they would rather burn at a stake than have their hands in such another business To shut up all I have been induced to insist so long upon the heinousness and danger of their sin who put the King to death because a thorow belief and due consideration of what I have said and I do aver it is all true might and would in my opinion be a very great security against all publick Mutinies Insurrections and Civil Wars hereafter For if the people of England did universally and all as one man dread the thoughts of Regicide as of a sin next to that which is unpardonable there would be no cause to fear Rebellion for then would men be govern'd and over-aw'd by this Dilemna If the King against whom we rebel shall always keep his head we shall lose our lives first or last but if he lose his head by our means and contrivances we shall be in great danger to lose our Souls which is worse For what will it profit a man to gain the whole world and to lose his own Soul FINIS
rather to scare men than to hurt them and causeth Conscience to smite them that if that will serve the turn he may hold his hand for it is better to fall into the hand of Conscience than into the hand of God If God had not such a witness as Conscience is how could he convict men at the day of Judgment of secret sins as the Text saith God will bring every secret thing to light whether it be good or whether it be evil and in the 1 Corinth 4.5 is said God will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and make manifest the counsels of the heart What but Conscience can witness against Men at the day of Judgment their Heart Murthers Heart Adulteries as Solomon said to Shimei 1 Kings 2.44 Thou knowest all the wickedness which thy Heart is privy to Now Conscience is such a witness as none can withstand or deny its testimony If two credible witnesses are sufficient even in matter of Life and Death much more Conscience which is a thousand witnesses Hence it is that we read of him who coming to a Wedding Feast without a Wedding Garment that when the King said unto him Friend How camest thou in hither not having a Wedding Garment he was speechless Matth. 22.12 Hence also we read of Every Mouth being stopt and all the World becoming guilty before God Rom. 3.19 Hence it was that no reply was made to our Saviour when he said He that wâ—â— without sin let him cast the first stone at her for the Text saith John 8.9 They which heard it being convicted in their own Consciences went out one by one Now whereas some are brought in pleading thus for themselves at the day of Judgement When did we see thee Hungry and fed thee not Naked and clothed thee not Sick and in Prison and did not administer unto thee Matth. 25.44 The reason is because they knew not that which Christ tells them of in the next verse In as much as you did it not to one of the least of these you did it not to me If their Consciences had been sooner convicted of their unkindness to their Saviour expressed in their unkindness to his Disciples and Followers they would not have had one word to say for themselves or presumed to open their Mouths It can never be doubted whether the Message were left with those Persons whom Conscience was appointed to warn because Conscience alwayes speaks with the Parties themselves and leaves its errand in their own Breasts Indeed when Christ shall come to judge the World it is said He will come like a Thief in the night Yea when God comes to ruine Persons or Nations after fair warnings given but never taken he oft-times doth it suddenly Hence Destruction is said to come as a whirlwind or as sorrow upâ—n a Woman in Travel who are sometimes never better at ease or more light-some or cheerful than just before their Pains hence those words of Solomon Prov. 29.1 He that being often reproved hardeneth his Neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy There we read indeed of sudden destruction but of frequent reproof going before it Now Conscience is the great Reprover and a man is never throughly convicted as to himself till he be so of his own Conscience so I have done with the first use Second Vse The next Use or Corollary is this If Conscience be such a Smiter as hath been shewed then it is no argument that sinners scape scot-free or go unpunished because their sins do not go before to Judgment that is are kept secret from men and consequently exempted from Humane Punishment Pain and Shame because it is Punishment enough God wot for a Man to run the Gantlet and undergo the Rack of his own Conscience If God shall but say take him Conscience take him by the Throat clap Irons upon him throw him in thy Dungeon feed him with the Bread of Spiritual Affliction and give him those Waters to drink which are more bitter than the Waters of Marah If the great Judge shall thus deliver up a man to the severest of Jaylors and say throw him in Prison and give him no hope to come out till he pay the utmost farthing Handle him as thou didst Cain Judas Francis Spira for thou canst do it teach him as Gideon taught the Men of Succoth with Bryers and Thorns tear him in pieces and let none deliver him Psal 15.22 If such a sentence as that shall come forth from the great God he upon whom it is past needs no Poverty no loss of near and dear Relations no Bodily Sickness or Pain no Temporal Prison no Reproach or Disgrace from Men to make him miserable nay he shall be so in spight of Riches Honour Power the best of Wives and Children the kindest of Relations and Friends and what ever else this World can give him he shall tremble as did Belshazzar even when quaffing and carouzing with all his Friends about him he shall fit Uneasie and as it were upon Thorns though he sit upon a Throne with his Crown on his Head and his Scepter in his Hand and Thousands of Nobles standing bare before him he shall not be heartily merry though upon his Wedding day nor at the Birth and Baptizing of a brave Son long desired nor at a Prince-like Feast when he hath all his Kindred and Friends about him the rarest Wines shall not be able to make him merry till they have made him not himself and then how he can be said to be merry who is not himself I know not Wine commonly makes the Brute or Brutal part of Man merry but what is that to the Man or to the Soul of Man which is himself God knows if Conscience be wounded a Man can possess no Mirth but what is rather to be called Madness or like the Laughter or Dancing of those who are stung with a Tarantula and let the Beast or Beastial part of Man be never so Brisk and Jocond that which is properly called the Soul viz. The Humane rational Soul or Spirit of a Man intermeddles not with its joys which makes me think of the Apostles words The Widow which liveth in Pleasure is Dead while she lives for what is Death but a separation of Soul and Body and in this case Soul and Body are separated for her animated Body hath Pleasure but her Soul hath none Reader If thou hadst ever known what the smitings of Conscience mean I need not tell thee that they are sufficient to give a man a very Hell upon Earth whilst they who behold his outward Prosperity not knowing where the Shooe pinches him do think him as it were in Heaven if there be any such thing as Heaven upon Earth So I have done with the second Vse The Third Vse is this If Conscience be so great and terrible a smiter it must needs be great folly in Men needlesly to provoke and inrage it as too many do from day to
day for there are a sort of Men of whom David speaks Who are wont to transgress without a cause Psal 25.3 David speaks of some who were his Enemies without a cause Psal 7. and without Cause had hid their net for him in a Pit which without cause they digged for him Psal 35.7 May it not be said of some that they are Enemies to God and to the Peace of their own Minds by making work for Conscience and for Repentance without any considerable cause Of this sort are those who abound in needless Oaths and Execrations crying at every turn I will be hang'd if this or that be not so Yea here and there you have a Monster of a Man that fears not upon every slight occasion to cry God damn me as if he defied his maker and scorned that Tophet which was prepared of old for such as he which God hath made deep and large the Pile whereof is much Wood and the Breath of the Lord like a stream of Brimstone doth kindle it Isa 30.33 Or as if they could cheerfully drink of the Wine of the Wrath of God which is poured out with mixture into the Cup of his Indignation and endure to be tormented with Fire and Brimstone in the presence of the Holy Angels and in the presence of the Lamb and to have the smoak of their torment ascending for ever and ever and to have no rest day nor night Rev. 14.10 11. Or as if when the question is put Who can dwell with the consuming Fire who can dwell with everlasting Burnings as it is Isa 33.14 they could roundly answer That can we do If so they have stouter hearts than sinners in old time were wont to have for the Text saith The sinners in Zion are afraid fearfulness hath surprized the Hypocrites saying Who shall dwell with devouring Fire c. Methinks I can resemble these Persons to nothing so much as to the Priests of Baal spoken of 1 Kings 18.28 of whom it is said They cried aloud and cut themselves after their manner with Knives and Launces till the Blood guished out upon them Many who laugh at the Papist for whipping themselves on Good-Friday do worse for that Papists do in point of Devotion aiming 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to beat down their Bodies as we translate it by beating them Black and Blew but Atheists slash and gash their Souls with severe stroaks for no good intent at all but out of meer Irreligion and wanton Prophaneness Lord I can but think how these men will look when Conscience shall come to reckon with them and they find themselves not able to answer it one of a thousand I can but think how pale they will look or rather how black in the Face with fear and astonishment what a dreadful eccho those Oaths and bloody Curses will have in Mens Ears when they come to be resounded upon a Sick-bed or Death-bed Or rather in what a pickle those men will be when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven with his mighty Angels in flaming Fire taking vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ and they see themselves punished with everlasting Destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power 2 Thes 1.7 8 9. If it be so terrible as it is to hear but a zealous Minister warmly discoursing of the Torments of Hell especially if a Mans Conscience at the same time second what he saith and joyn issue with the Preacher as did the Conscience of Felix of whom it is said Acts 24.25 That when Paul reasoned of Righteousness Temperance and Judgement to come Felix trembled I say if the bare hearing of Hell be so terrible as to make a Heathen Judge upon the Bench tremble at the words of his poor Prisoner at the Bar standing there to await his Sentence how intollerable will it be to feel such things And who can chuse when in the midst of those Flames but cry out as did the Sinners and Hypocrites in Zion Who can dwell with devouring Fire Who can dwell with everlasting Burnings You would be loath constantly to sit under the Ministry of a Boanerges that would be alwayes thundring and lightning preaching of Hell and Damnation flashing Hell-fire in your Faces with every Sermon as if Mount Sinah were his Pulpit but were your Minister such you could make a shift and an excuse to go out of the Church as oft as he came to his use of terrour and stay out of his way till the storm were over but if you provoke your Consciences and make them burning as well as shining Lights within you as that phrase may be taken whether will you fly from those flames and whereunto will you betake your selves Go whither you will Conscience will follow you and if you have Ears to hear will make you hear yea will find you Ears if you make as if you had none yea speak loud enough to be heard though you were almost dead or were disposed to turn a deaf Ear upon it Conscience will have access to you at all hours even in the dead and still of the night it will come stealing upon you like a Thief in the night nay that it need not do neither for it will make bold with greatest noise to burst your Iron Bars break open your Doors and make a loud and forcible entrance upon you when it pleases and look upon it self to be always at home when it is where you are yea to be Master of the House and to have full authority to speak and do within your Breasts what it listeth Conscience is as it were every Mans Chamberlain and carrieth the Key of every Mans Breast as it were at his Girdle and therefore can go or get into a Man when it pleaseth and if they do as it were bolt or bar the Door on the inside it is able to make even Brass or Iron Grates to fly open before it for nothing can keep Conscience out Now Conscience being such a thing as I have described what Solomon saith viz. He that passeth by and medleth with strife that belongeth not to him is like one that taketh a Dog by the Ears may be applied to Conscience And therefore it must needs be folly and madness in any Man needlesly to provoke his Conscience and without great cause and temptation to make work for it as he were mad that would rouze up a sleepy Lion or Mastiff when he had no occasion so to do So much shall serve for the 3. Vse Fourth Vse shall be this Sith it is the office of Conscience to smite Men as in reference to sin it must needs behove us to keep our Consciences alwayes in smiting case I do not mean to give them cause to smite us for that we should by no means do but to keep them in an aptitude and fitness to smite us when just cause is given What is a Dog good for if he
You may conceive that indignation to be wherewith Conscience resents it when any Man saith to it either in words or in effect As for what thou hast spoken to me in the Name of the Lord I will not do it but whatsoever proceedeth out of my own Heart and Mouth that will I do The day is yet to come in which Conscience ever did or ever will speak peace to those that are in flat rebellion against it and as the Text saith Had Zimri peace who slew his Master So may it be said Had ever any Man peace whilst he was in actual Arms and Hostility against his Conscience No no The way to peace and tranquility of Mind is to do nothing but by full and free leave and consent of our well informed Consciences Direct 5. If thou wouldst shun the smiteings of Conscience being so terrible as thou hast heard they are give thy Conscience the preferrence and preheminence above all other faculties of thy Soul yea above all other Creatures interest and considerations whatsoever The interest of God and Conscience is one and the same and therefore that Interest should take place of all others Say not my Will and Affections nor yet my Pleasure Profit nor Honour do incline or invite me this or that way If Conscience suggest other things and say O do not that thing whereto thy will and affections are so much inclined or thou so much tempted by thy worldly interest for Conscience is more than all the rest All other Sheaves ought to bow to the Sheave of Conscience to allude to what was prophesied and as it were tipified concerning Joseph and his Brethren that they should be subject to him We have a Proverb My Mind to me a Kingdom is To be sure every Mans Conscience is his Kingdom So long as any Man holds the possession of a good and unvanquished Conscience he may be said to be in his Kingdom for surely among those Kings of whom God saith By me Kings Reign Conscience is one Dejure and he admits of Tyrany and Vsurpation in his Soul who suffers any other Creature to rule over him or any being but he that is The King of Kings and Lord of Lords One saith well That Peace is every thing in Gods Order and that there is not rue Peace but where it is so you may therefore conclude that where the soveraignty of Conscience next and immediately under the great God is not owned and submitted to there can be no Peace for so long as Conscience can hold a Scepter in his Hand he will smite all such Persons or do what is worse Direct 6. If thou wouldst disable COnscience from smiting or arresting thee labour alwayes to carry a pardon about thee signed and sealed with the Blood of Jesus have thy Discharge and Acquittance from the great God alwayes in readiness to produce then mayest thou presently stop the mouth of Conscience if it begin to accuse thee with such words as those Rom. 8.33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect it is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth it is Christ that died nay rather that is risen again c. Then may you say using the Apostles words 1 Cor. 6.11 And such meaning such great sinners were some of you but you are washed but you are sanctified but you are justified in the Name of our Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God Lastly Thou mayest build upon it that a well informed Conscience will never smite thee so as to do thee any great hurt if thou canst but sincerely say of thy self what Saint Paul saith of himself Acts 24.16 Herein do I exercise my self to have alwayes a Conscience void of offence towards God and towards Man Nay let me tell you the fore-going Directions well observed and practised will not onely prevent the stripes and smitings of Conscience but also procure the smiles thereof and cause it to speak to thee in such Language as the great Judge will to all true believers at the great day saying Well done good and faithful servant enter into the joy of thy Lord. FINIS The Second DISCOURSE OF No Conscience OR Of the Murthering OF King Charles I. Calculated more especially to be Read on any Thirtieth Day of JANVARY BY DOCTOR SAMUEL ROLLS One of His Majesties Chaplains in Ordinary LONDON Printed 1678. The Second Discourse NOw Reader if thou art only for Practical Divinity stop here and go no further for I confess to thee what remains will be partly Polemical partly Political being such as the solemnity of the 30th day of January and the occasion of the Fast of that day doth call for For methinks if I may presume to know the Whispers of Mens Hearts I hear some prejudiced Persons object and say What cause hath any Mans Conscience to smite him for having been concerned in the Death of King Charles the First Why is he called a Martyr or why his Judges called Murtherers So many of them as died upon the account of that Fact Now why should I be thought uncharitable for imagining this to be the lauguage of some Mens Hearts since David saith Psal 36.1 The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart that there is no fear of God before his eyes there taking upon him to judge the Root in their hearts by the fruit in their lives there being so greata foundation in the practices of some men to judge so of their hearts Namely That they think the King no Martyr nor his Judges no Murtherers Nay what if some do think That they were the true Martyrs who suffer'd for putting the King to death This will be more easie for any man to believe if he shall but consider that not one of all those men that were condemned and executed for giving Sentence against the late King of Blessed Memory would ever acknowledge that he had sinned against God in so doing Since they did seem to be of that mind who had the Microscope of Death before them which I so call because death oft makes men spy small faults in themselves who before could not espy great ones Doubtless there are many others of the same mind though a man would wonder that there should be such a vail of ignorance upon the hearts of any that are called Christians as not to know so black and foul a Crime as that to be a sin But sith so it is that some if they durst would rather applaud that Bloody Fact than profess to abhor it and would not doubt to say That Ministers in observing the Thirtieth day of January as a solemn Fast do but mock God and flatter the State being a time which some had rather keep as a day of Thanksgiving the more their Sin and Shame I think it but necessary not in order to kindling of Coals or increasing Animosities or causing the surviving relations of the Kings Judges to be more hated and scorned for God knows I abhor any such