causers themselves can do so that of all wonders yet this is the greatest to Me. But it may be easily gathered how those men intend to govern who have used Me thus And if it be My hard Fate to fall together with the Liberty of this Kingdom I shall not blush for My self but much lament the future Miseries of My People the which I shall still pray to God to avert whatever becomes of Me. CHARLES R. Meditations upon DEATH after the Votes of Non-Addresses and His MAJESTIES closer Imprisonment in Carisbrook Castle AS I have leisure enough so I have cause more than enough to meditate upon and prepare for my Death for I know there are but few steps between the Prisons and Graves of Princes It is God's indulgence which gives Me the space but Mans Cruelty that gives Me the sad occasions for these thoughts For besides the common burthen of Mortality which lies upon Me as a Man I now bear the heavy load of other mens Ambitions Fears Jealousies and cruel Passions whose Envy or Enmity against Me makes their own lives seem deadly to them while I enjoy any part of Mine I thank God my Prosperity made Me not wholly a stranger to the contemplations of Mortality Those are never unseasonabble since this is alwayes uncertain Death being an Eclipse which oft happeneth as well in clear as cloudy dayes But my now long and sharp Adversity hath so reconciled in Me those natural Antipathies between Life and Death which are in all men that I thank God the common terrours of it are dispelled and the special horrour of it as to My particular much allayed for although my Death at present may justly be represented to Me with all those terrible aggravations which the policy of Cruel and Implacable enemies can put upon it affairs being drawn to the very dregs of Malice yet I bless God I can look upon all those stings as unpoisonous though sharp since my Redeemer hath either pulled them out or given Me the Antidote of his Death against them which as to the Immaturity Unjustice Shame Scorn and Cruelty of it exceeded whatever I can fear Indeed I never did find so much the Life of Religion the Feast of a good Conscience and the brazen wall of a judicious Integrity and Constancy as since I came to these closer conflicts with the thoughts of Death I am not so old as to be weary of Life nor I hope so bad as to be either afraid to dye or ashamed to live true I am so afflicted as might make Me sometime even desire to dye if I did not consider that it is the greatest glory of a Christians life to dye daily in conquering by a lively Faith and patient Hopes of a better life those partial and quotidian deaths which kill us as it were by piece-meals and make us overlive our own fates while we are deprived of Health Honour Liberty Power Credit Safety or Estate and those other Comforts of dearest Relations which are as the Life of our lives Though as a KING I think My self to live in nothing temporal so much as in the Love and good will of my People for which as I have suffered many deaths so I hope I am not in that point as yet wholly dead notwithstanding my Enemies have used all the poison of Falsity and violence of Hostility to destroy first the Love and Loyalty which is in my Subjects and then all that content of Life in Me which from these I chiefly enjoyed Indeed they have left Me but little of Life and only the husk and shell as it were which their further Malice and Cruelty can take from Me having bereaved Me of all those worldly Comforts for which Life it self seems desirable to men But O my Soul think not that Life too long or tedious wherein God gives Thee any opportunities if not to do yet to suffer with such Christian Patience and Magnanimity in a good Cause as are the greatest Honour of our Lives and the best improvement of our Deaths I know that in point of true Christian Valour it argues Pusillanimity to desire to dye out of weariness of life and a want of that heroick greatness of spirit which becomes a Christian in the patient and generous sustaining those Afflictions which as shadows necessarily attend us while we are in this Body and which are lessened or enlarged as the Sun of our Prosperity moves higher or lower whose total absence is best recompenced with the dew of Heaven The assaults of Affliction may be terrible like Sampson's Lion but they yield much sweetness to those that dare to encounter and overcome them who know how to overlive the witherings of their Gourds without discontent or peevishness while they may yet converse with God That I must dye as a Man is certain that I may dye a King by the hands of my own Subjects a violent sudden and barbarous death in the strength of my years in the midst of my Kingdoms my Friends and loving Subjects being helpless Spectators my Enemies insolent Revilers and Triumphers over Me living dying and dead is so probable in humane reason that God hath taught Me not to hope otherwise as to mans Cruelty however I despair not of God's infinite Mercy I know my Life is the object of the Devils and Wicked mens Malice but yet under God's sole custody and disposal whom I do not think to flatter for longer Life by seeming prepared to die but I humbly desire to depend upon him and to submit to his will both in life and death in what order soever he is pleased to lay them out to Me. I confess it is not easie for Me to contend with those many horrors of Death wherewith God suffers Me to be tempted which are equally horrid either in the suddenness of a barbarous Assassination or in those greater formalities whereby my Enemies being more solemnly cruel will it may be seek to add as those did who crucified Christ the Mockery of Justice to the Cruelty of Malice That I may be destroyed as with greater Pomp and Artifice so with less Pity it will be but a necessary policy to make my Death appear as an act of Justice done by Subjects upon their Soveraign who know that no Law of God or Man invests them with any power of Judicature without Me much less against Me and who being sworn and bound by all that is Sacred before God and Man to endeavour my Preservation must pretend Justice to cover their Perjury It is indeed a sad fate for any man to have his Enemies to be his Accusers Parties and Judges but most desperate when this is acted by the insolence of Subjects against their Soveraign wherein those who have had the chiefest hand and are most guilty of contriving the publick Troubles must by shedding My Blood seem to wash their own hands of that innocent blood whereof they are now most evidently guilty before God and Man and I believe in their own
and in this they were so earnest that they would not willingly withdraw whilest it was debated and then they had leave to depart with this Answer That the House of Commons had already endeavoured Relief from the Lords in their Requests and shall so continue till Redress be obtained Such Petitions as these were likewise from the several Classes of the inferiour Tradesmen about London as Porters Water-men and the like and that nothing of testifying an universal Importunity might be left unattempted Women were perswaded to present Petitions to the same effect While the Faction thus boasted in the success of their Arts Good men grieved to see these daily Infamies of the supreme Council of the Nation all whose Secrets were published to the lowest and weakest part of the People and they who clamoured it as a breach of their Priviledge that the King took notice of their Debates now made them the Subjects of Discourse in every Shop and all the corners of the Street where the good and bad were equally censured and the Honour and Life of every Senator exposed to the Verdict of the Rabble No Magistrate did dare to do his Office and all things tended to a manifest Confusion So that many sober Persons did leave the Kingdom as unsase where Factions were more powerful than the Laws And Just Persons chose rather to hear than to see the Miseries and Reproaches of their Country On the other side to make the King more plyable they tempt Him by danger in His most beloved Part the Queen concerning whom they caused a Rumour that they did intend to impeach Her of High Treason This Rumour made the deeper Impression because they had raised most prodigious Slanders which are the first Marks for destruction of Princes on Her and when they had removed all other Counsellors from the King She was famed to be the Rock upon which all hopes of Peace and Safety were split That She commanded no less His Counsels than Affections and that His Weakness was so great as not to consent to or enterprize any thing which She did not first approve That She had perverted Him to Her Religion and formed designs of overthrowing the Protestant Profession These and many other of a portentuous falshood were scattered among the Vulgar who are alwayes most prone to believe the Worst of Great Persons and the uncontrolled Licence of reporting such Calumnies is conceived the first Dawning of Liberty But the Parliament taking notice of the Report sent some of their House to purge themselves from it as an unjust Scandal cast upon them To which the Queen mildly answers That there was a general Report thereof but She never saw any Articles in writing and having no certain Author for either She gave little credit thereto nor will She believe they would lay any Aspersion upon Her who hath been very unapt to misconstrue the actions of any One person and much more the Proceedings of Parliament and shall at all times wish an Happy Vnderstanding between the King and His People But the King knowing how usual it was for the Faction by Tumults and other Practices to transport the Parliament from their Just Intentions in other things and that they might do so in this resolved to send Her into Holland under colour of accompanying their Eldest Daughter newly married to the Prince of Orange but in truth to secure Her so that by the fears of Her danger who was so dear unto Him He might not be forced to any thing contrary to His Honour and Conscience and that Her Affections and Relation to Him might not betray Her Life to the Malice of His Enemies With Her He also sent all the Jewels of the Crown that they might not be the spoils of the Faction but the means of the support of Her Dignity in foreign parts if His Necessities afterwards should not permit Him to provide for Her otherwise Which yet She did not so employ but reserved them for a supply of Ammunition and Arms when His Adversaries had forced Him to a necessary Defence It was said that the Faction knew of this conveyance and might have prevented it but that they thought it for their greater advantage that this Treasure should be so managed that the King in confidence of that assistance might take up Arms to which they were resolved at last to drive Him For they thought their Cause would be better in War than Peace because their present Deliberations were in the sense of the Law actual Rebellions and a longer time would discover those Impostures by which they had deluded the People who would soon leave them as many now did begin to repent of their Madness to the Vengeance which was due to their practices unless they were more firmly united by a communion of guilt in an open assaulting their Lawfull Prince The King hastens the security of the Queen and accompanies Her as far as Dover there to take his farewell of Her a business almost as irksome as death to be separated from a Wife of so great Affections and eminent Endowments and that which made it the more bitter was that the same cause which forced Her Separation from Him set Her at a greater distance from His Religion the only thing wherein their Souls were not united even the Barbarity of His Enemies who professed it yet were so irreconcileable to Vertue that they hated Her for Her Example of Love and Loyalty to Him While He was committing Her to the mercy of the Winds and Waves that She might escape the Cruelty of more unquiet and faithless men they prosecute Him with their distasteful Addresses and at Canterbury present Him with a Bill for taking away Bishops Votes in Parliament Which having been cast out of the House of Peers several times before ought not by the Course and Order of Parliament to have been admitted again the same Session But the Faction had now used their accustomed Engine a Tumult and it was then passed by the Lords and brought hither together with some obscure Threats that if it were not signed the Queen should not be suffered to depart By such impious Violences did they make way for that which they call'd Reformation This His Majesty signs though after it made a part of His penitential Confessions to God in hopes that that Bill being once consented to the Fury of the Faction which with so great Violence pursued an absolute Destruction of the Ecclesiastical Government would be abated as having advanced so far in their design to weaken the King's Power in that House by the loss of so many Voices which would have been alwayes on that side where Equity and Conscience did most appear But He soon found the Demagogues had not so much Ingenuity as to be compounded with and they made this but a step to the overthrow of that which He designed to preserve When His Majesty was come back as far as Greenwich He met with many informations how averse the Faction was
with Adversity and to make Him glorious by Sufferings which being well born truly prove men Great yet would He furnish Him almost by a Miracle likewise with such Advantages in the conduct of which His Prudence and Magnanimity might evidence that He did deserve Prosperity and by clearing up even this way His eminent Vertues warn the following Ages from a Credulity to unquiet Persons since the best of Princes was thus infamously slandered From all these concurring Causes each one in their Way and Order did the King's strength so far increase as that He won many Battels and was not far from Conquest in the Whole War had not God seen fit to afflict this sinful Nation with Numerous and most Impious Tyrants and make us feel that no Oppressions are so unsupportable as those which are imposed by such as have made the highest Pretensions to Liberty of which we had bitter experience after the War was sinished that was now begun For there had been some slight Conflicts e're this in the several Counties betwixt the Commissioners of Array and the Militia with various Successes which require just Volumes and compleat Histories to relate and cannot be comprehended in the short View of the King's Life where it is only intended to speak of those Battels in which the King in Person gave sufficient evidence of His Wisdom and Valour The first of which was at Edge-Hill on Octob. 23. For the King had no sooner gotten a considerable Force though not equal to those of His Enemies but He marched towards London and in His way thither met with Essex's Army that were come from thence to take Him The King having viewed their Army by a Prospective-glass from the top of that Hill and being asked afterwards by His Officers what He meant to do To give them battel said He with a present Courage it is the first time I ever saw the Rebels in a body God and good mens Prayers to Him assist the Justice of My Cause and immediately prepared for the Fight which was acted with such a fury that near 6000 according to the common Account but some say a far less number were slain upon the place Night concluded this Battel which had comprehended the whole War had not the King 's prevailing Horse preferr'd the Spoils to Victory and left the Enemy some advantage to dispute for her But the King had all the fairest marks of her favour For though He had lost His General yet He kept the Field possessed the dead Bodies opened His way toward London and in the sight of some part of the Army of Essex who accounted it a Victory that He was not totally routed and killed took Banbury and entred Triumphantly into Oxford which He had designed for His Winter-quarters with 150 Colours taken in sight And having assured that place He advances towards London whither Essex had gotten before Him and disposed his bassled Regiments within ten miles of the City yet the King fell upon two Regiments of them at Brainford took 500 Prisoners and sunk their Ordnance From thence intending to draw nearer London He had intelligence that the City had poured forth all their Auxiliaries to re-inforce Essex's Troops to which being unwilling to oppose His Souldiers wearied with their March nor thinking it safe to force an Enemy to fight upon Necessity which inspires a more than Ordinary Fury He retreats to Oxford having taught His Enemies that He was not easily to be Overcome For in the management of this Battel He did not only undeceive the abused world of those Slanders which His Enemies had polluted Him with but He exceeded that Opinion His own Party had of His Abilities And though He parted from London altogether unexperienced in Martial affairs yet at Edge-Hill He appeared a most Excellent Commander His Valour was also equal to His Prudence and He could as well endure Labours as despise Dangers And by a communication of toils encouraged His Souldiers to keep the Field all the night when they saw He refused the refreshments of a Bed for He sought no other Shelter from the injuries of the Air than His own Coach These Vertues and this Success made such an impression on the Parliament that though they took all courses to hide the Infamy of their worsted Army yet in more humble Expressions than formerly they Petitioned the King for a Treaty of Peace which His Majesty very earnestly embraced But the Faction who were frighted with these Tendencies to an Accommodation cause some of the City to Petition against it and to make profer of their Lives and Fortunes for the prosecution of the War Encouraged by this they form their Propositions like the Commands of Conquerours and so streighten the Power and Time of their Commissioners that the Treaty at Oxford became fruitless which there had taken up all the King's employment this Winter though abroad His Forces were busie in several Parts of the Nation not without honour Anno 1643. At the Opening of the Spring the Queen comes back to England bringing with Her some considerable Supplies of Men Money and Ammunition and Her coming was entertained with such a Series of Successes that the King that Summer was Master of the North and West except some few Garrisons Which so dismayed the Parliament that very many of them were preparing to quit the Kingdom and had the King followed His own Counsels to march immediately towards London and not been fatally over-born at a Council of War which it is said His Enemies at London did assure their Party would so be first to attempt Gloucester He had in the judgement of all discerning men then finished the War with Glory But here He lay so long till Essex had gotten a Recruit from London and came time enough to relieve the Town though in his return the King necessitated him to fight worsted him near Newbery and so bravely followed him the next day that He forced the Parliaments Horse which were left in the Reer to seek their safety by making their way over a great part of their Foot yet lost on His side much Noble Blood as the Earls of Carnarvan and Sunderland and Viscount Falkland This last was lamented by all being equally dexterous at the Pen and Sword had won some Wreathes in those Controversies that were to be managed by Reason and was eminent in all the Generous parts of Learning above any of his Fortune and Dignity After this Encounter the King returns to Oxford to Consult with those Members of both Houses that had left the Impostures and Tumults at London to joyn with Him for the common benefit who being as to the Peers the far greater and as to the Commons an equal Number with those at Westminster they assumed the Name and Authority of Parliament and deliberated of the ways of Peace and means to prevent the Desolations which the Faction so furiously designed who were now resolving to encrease our Miseries by Calling in the Scots to their
White-Hall and so into the Cabinet-Chamber where He continued some time in Devotion while they were fitting the Theatre of His Murther While these things were acting the Lord Fairfax who had alwayes forborn any publick appearance in the practices of this Murther had taken up as is credibly reported some Resolutions either in abhorrency of the Crime or by the Solicitations of others with his own Regiment though none else should follow him to hinder the Execution This being suspected or known Cromwell Ireton and Harrison coming to him after their usual way of deceiving endeavoured to perswade him that the LORD had rejected the King and with such like Language as they knew had formerly prevailed upon him concealing that they had that very morning signed the Warrant for the Assassination they also desired him with them to seek the LORD by Prayer that they might know his mind in the thing Which he assenting to Harrison was appointed for the Duty and by compact to draw out his profane and blasphemous Discourse to God in such a length as might give time for the Execution which they privately sent to their Instruments to hasten of which when they had notice that it was past they rose up and perswaded the General that this was a full return of Prayer and God having so manifested his pleasure they were to acquiesce in it There was likewise another attempt made by Col. Downes who had disturbed them in their Court to obstruct them in their Execution for it is said that he endeavoured to make a Mutiny in the Army to hinder the Wickedness but the hast of the Assassinates prevented him While these men acted their Wickedness by Prayers to the lasting reproach of Christianity the King after He had sinished His Supplications was through the Banqueting-House brought to the Scaffold which was dress'd to terrour for it was all hung with Black where were attending two Executioners in Disguises and the Axe and the Block prepared But it prevailed not to affright Him whose Soul was already panting after another Life And therefore He entred this ignominious and gastly Theatre with the same mind as He used to carry to His Throne shewing no fear of death but a Solicitude for those that should live after Him Looking about He saw divers Companies of Horse and Foot so placed on each side of the Street and about the Scaffold that the People could not come near Him and those that saw could not be Hearers therefore omitting that Speech which it was probable He would have spoken to the People He spoke to the Officers and those that were then about Him that which is now printed among His Works Having ended His Speech He declared His Profession of Religion and while He was preparing for the Block He expressed what were His Hopes for all the Righteous have such in Death saying I have a good Cause and a Gracious God on my side I go from a Corruptible to an Incorruptible Crown where no disturbance can be no disturbance in the world After this composing Himself to an Address to God having His Eyes and Hands like fore-runners lifted up to Heaven and expressing some short and private Ejaculations He kneeled down before the Block as at a Desk of Prayer and meekly submitted His Crowned Head to the pleasure of His God to be profaned by the Axe of the disguised Executioner which was suddenly severed from His Body by one strong stroke So sell CHARLES the First and with Him expired the Glory and Liberty of Three Nations Thus the King finished His Martyrdom but His Enemies not their Malice who extended their Cruelty beyond His Life and abused the Headless Trunk Some washed their hands in the Royal Blood others dipt their staves in it and that they might indulge their insatiate Covetousness as well as their boundless Inhumanity they sold the chips of the Block and the sands that were discoloured with His Blood and exposed His very Hairs to sale which the Spectators purchased for different uses Some did it to preserve the Reliques of so Glorious a Prince whom they so dearly loved Others hoped that they would be as means of Cure for that disease which our English Kings through the Indulgence of Heaven by Their touch did usually heal and it was reported that these Reliques experienced failed not of the effect And some out of a brutish malice would have them as spoils and trophees of their hatred to their Lawfull Sovereign Cromwell that he might feed his eyes with Cruelty and satisfie his sollicitous Ambition which aspired at Monarchy when the Lawfull King was destroyed curiously surveyed the murthered Carcass when it was brought in the Coffin into White-Hall and to assure himself the King was quite dead with his singers searched the wound whether the Head were fully severed from the body or no. Afterwards they delivered the body to be unbowelled to an infamous Empirick of the Faction together with the rude Chirurgions of the Army not permitting the King 's own Physicians to this Office who were all most implacable enemies to His Majesty and commanded them to search which was as much as to bid them so report whether they could not find in it Symptomes of the French disease or some evidences of Frigidity and natural impotency that so they might have some colour to slander Him who was eminent for Chastity or to make His Seed infamous But this wicked design was prevented by a Physician of great Integrity and Skill who intruding himself among them at the Dissection by his Presence and Authority kept the obsequious Wretches from gratifying their Opprobrious Masters And the same Physician also published that Nature had tempered the Royal Body to a longer life than commonly is granted to other men And as His Soul was fitted by Heroick Vertues to Eternity so His Body by a Temperament almost ad pondus made as near an approach to it as the present Condition of Mortality would permit Failing in these Opportunities of Calumny with more Impudence and Rancor they use other wayes to make Him odious and rase the Love of Him out of the People's hearts They conclude from the outward unhappinesses of His Reign unto an hatred of God against Him and with the same Confidence as they inrolled themselves in the List of the Saints and entred their own names in the Book of Life they blotted His out and placed Him in some of the dark and comfortless Cells of the damned and they commonly professed it among the Disciples of the Faction as an Article of their belief that it was impossible for Him or any of His party to be saved Not content with these Injuries to His Body and Soul they endeavour likewise to murther His Memory For they pull'd down His Statue which was placed at the West end of St. Paul's Church and that other in the Old Exchange and leaving the Arch void they writ over Exit Tyrannus Regum ultimus But the Providence of God hath shewed
Consciences too while they carried on unreasonable demands first by Tumults after by Armies Nothing makes mean spirits more cowardly-cruel in managing their usurped Power against their lawfull Superious than this the Guilt of their unjust Vsurpation notwithstanding those specious and popular pretensions of Justice against Delinquents applyed only to disguise at first the monstrousness of their designs who despaired indeed of possessing the power and profits of the Vineyard till the Heir whose right it is be cast out and slain With them my greatest Fault must be that I would not either destroy My self with the Church and State by my Word or not suffer them to do it unresisted by the Sword whose covetous Ambition no Concessions of Mine could ever yet either satisfie or abate Nor is it likely they will ever think that Kingdom of Brambles which some men seek to erect at once weak sharp and fruitless either to God or Man is like to thrive till watered with the Royal Blood of those whose right the Kingdom is Well God's will be done I doubt not bu◠my Innocency will find him both my Protector and my Advocate who is my only Judge whom I own as King of Kings not only for the eminency of His Power and Majesty above them but also for that singular Care and Protection which he hath over them who knows them to be exposed to as many Dangers being the greatest Patrons of Law Justice Order and Religion on Earth as there be either Men or Devils which love Confusion Nor will he suffer those men long to prosper in their Babel who build it with the Bones and cement it with the Blood of their KINGS I am confident they will find Avengers of my Death among themselves the Injuries I have sustained from them shall be first punished by them who agreed in nothing so much as in opposing Me. Their impatience to bear the loud cry of my Blood shall make them think no way better to expiate 〈◊〉 than by shedding theirs who with them most thirsted after Mine The sad Confusions following my Destruction are already presaged and confirmed to Me by those I have lived to see since my Troubles in which God alone who only could hath many wayes pleaded my Cause not sustering them to go unpunished whose Confederacy in Sin was their only Security who have cause to fear that God will both further divide and by murual Vengeance afterward destroy them My greatest conquest of Death is from the Power and Love of Christ who hath swallow'd up Death in the Victory of his Resurrection and the glory of his Ascension My next Comfort is that he gives Me not only the honour to imitate his Example in suffering for Righteousness sake though obscured by the foulest charges of Tyranny and Injustice but also that Charity which is the noblest Revenge upon and Victory over my Destroyers by which I thank God I can both forgive them and pray for them that God would not impute my Blood to them further than to convince them what need they have of Christs Blood to wash their Souls from the guilt of shedding Mine At present the Will of my Enemies seems to be their only rule their Power the measure and their Success the exactor of what they please to call Justice while they flatter themselves with the fancy of their own Safety by My Danger and the security of their Lives and Designs by My Death forgetting that as the greatest temptations to Sin are wrapped up in seeming Prosperities so the severest Vengeances of God are then most accomplished when men are suffered to compleat their wicked purposer I bless God I pray not so much that this bitter cup of a Violent Death may pass from Me as that of his Wrath may pass from all those whose hands by deserting me are sprinkled or by acting and consenting to my Death are embrued with my Blood The Will of God hath confined and concluded Mine I shall have the pleasure of dying without any pleasure of desired Vengeance This I think becomes a Christian toward his Enemies and a King toward his Subjects They cannot deprive Me of more than I am content to lose when God sees fit by their hands to take it from Me whose Mercy I believe will more than infinitely recompence whatever by Mans Injustice he is pleased to deprive me of The Glory attending my Death will far surpass all I could enjoy or conceive in Life I shall not want the heavy and envied Crowns of this world when my God hath mercifully crowned and consummated his Graces with Glory and exchanged the shadows of my Earthly Kingdoms among men for the substance of that Heavenly Kingdom with Himself For the censures of the world I know the sharp and necessary Tyranny of my Destroyers will sufficiently confute the Calumnies of Tyranny against Me I am perswaded I am happy in the judicious Love of the ablest and best of my Subjects who do not only pity and pray for Me but would be content even to die with Me or for Me. These know how to excuse my Failings as a Man and yet to retain and pay their Duty to Me as their KING there being no Religious necessity binding any Subjects by pretending to punish infinitely to exceed the faults and errours of their Princes especially there where more than sufficient Satisfaction hath been made to the publick the enjoyment of which private Ambitions have hitherto frustrated Others I believe of softer tempers and less advantaged by my Ruine do already feel sharp Convictions and some remorse in their Consciences where they cannot but see the proportions of their evil dealings against Me in the measure of God's retaliations upon them who cannot hope long to enjoy their own thumbs and toes having under pretence of paring others nails been so cruel as to cut off their chiefest strength The punishment of the more insolent and obstinate may be like that of Korah and his Complices at once mutining against both Prince and Priest in such a method of Divine Justice as is not ordinary the Earth of the lowest and meanest People opening upon them and swallowing them up in a just disdain of their ill-gotten and worse-used Authority upon whose support and strength they chiefly depended for their building and establishing their Designs against Me the Church and State My chiefest comfort in Death consists in my Peace which I trust is made with God before whose exact Tribunal I shall not fear to appear as to the Cause so long disputed by the Sword between Me and my causless Enemies where I doubt not but his Righteous Judgement will confute their Fallacy who from worldly Success rather like Sophisters than sound Christians draw those popular Conclusions for God's Approbation of their actions whose wise Providence we know oft permits many events which his revealed Word the only clear safe and fixed Rule of good Actions and good Consciences in no sort approves I am confident the Justice of my