Two Diseases I will and may affirm justly That if it be probable that the Lord hath been wont to foretell Great Troubles to Nations and Kingdomes and the issue of them and if it be certainly true that in all respects no Nation under Heaven upon whom the Name of God or Christ hath been called hath felt such miseries and so great in so short a space as the English have done in the last twenty years unless they have been predicted by the REKETS and KINGS-EVIL there was never of these great things any Divine Forewarning mentioned in any History Much less was any Prediction like to these but such as did quickly vanish after their appearance in a moment as it were or if any have been of longer continuance their matter and argument hath not been so copious But these Two Diseases the REKETS and KINGS-EVIL have been stable and constant the eldest of which in the Prodigious Healing thereof hath continued six hundred years The former of which as the Leprosie in time of the Law was to typifie the Great Cleanser Christ Jesus our spiritual King who was anointed with oyl of Grace above his fellows and as the Balm of Gilead and Pool of Bethesda were made to foreshew that Merciful Physician who with his blood should heal our sins and miseries and wash us from impurity was determined to shew Gods Providence Power Justiee and Mercy to poor England by the Hand and Government of his anointed Servant K. CHARLES II. Whose Person I say is with the other evils designed in the second Disease the KINGS-EVIL He is that Physician to cure those wounds and putrified sores which our State-Physicians as they have been often called have made and caused The things which are foreshewn are in General our Sins and our Calamities 2. The Authors those that have caused our miseries and 3. he which shall be our Deliverer The method of this discovery is plain for the Persons which have been and shall be the Authors of these contrary effects are plainly described as if it were by their names these in the one this in the other Disease The Sins and Calamities which some have been guilty of and which almost all have suffered are shewn unto us as under the Allegory and Type of Diseases in so plain a manner as that the Diseases are nothing else but in every part and circumstance living pictures of what we have done and suffered and but Metaphorical names of the very things And either they are the very pictures and likeness of the things which I would have them signifie and in this respect we give their natural signification or else they are Metaphorical expressions of such things and bear some good proportion unto the things which I shew they typisie Which Metaphors are not wrested and strained but easie and taken from Holy Scripture and used here in that signification in which they are there used Nor is there any Trope or Figure which is less hard to be understood nor more usual in our mother tongue or the Latine Greek or Hebrew tongues then Metaphors insomuch that for using of names to certain things we do not only commonly but by necessity borrow the names of other things that is use Metaphors Such are these expressions in ordinary and familiar use To be in high or low place that is to be honorable or without honor and it is taken from places high and low in a Physical notion so to be poor when there is little flesh upon any creature is borrowed from that word which properly signifies want of things necessary but is made to signifie being lean c. The SIGNIFICATION of the REKETS in each particular FIrst of all let us examine the Name of REKETS and therein shall we finde the names of those men which have caused our miseries The word Regentes is a Latine word signifying those that are Rulers and Governors whether in the highest or in a lower degree indifferently from rego to rule from which Latine word Regentes is derived a French word and English given to such a Person which exerciseth Regal authority though not a King as the Queen wife to the French King is by courtesie called Queen Regent to distinguish her from the Queen mother as if she had regal authority and like to the King The Vice-royâ— of Scotland are called Regents of Scotland This is the thing Governors taking upon them Regall authority not being Kings and under Kings are meant by this word REKETS with no greater alteration of letters but the very same which hath been found in our English tongue elsewhere For of Regents leaving out the letter n is made Regets as of Tenent which signifieth an opinion maintained by a man is made Tenet signifying the very same thing the letter n being omitted there also both which words we know are used promiscuously at this day And both Regent and Tenent Participles of the present tense and this from Teneo Then in Regets the letter g is turned into k and of Regets is made REKETS which change is also found in our English tongue Ghaucer in the Shipmans Prologue no. 13. saith His barge was called the Maudelain For that vessel which the Poet there and Barclay in his Poeme called The Ship of fools in sundry places calleth a barge we at this day do name as is well known a barke with the like mutation of g into k For the calling of it as we do REKETS pronouncing of it as if it were written with i in the first syllable there is little difference in the sound whether it be written with e or i for the letter i there sounds not full but like the sound of e insomuch that sometimes e is pronounced like as we would have i pronounced in RIKETS written with an i Thus is the letter e ordinarily pronounced in end metre Peter c. and in Devonshire well puteus is uttered as if the vowel and the word were the same with will voluntas Thus in the Name of this Disease are in the first place discovered those men who were the AUTHORS of our late CALAMITIES for according to the Name of the Disease they were not Kings but such as took upon them REGAL AUTHORITY For the Disease is not exprest by a word of the singular number REKET but plurally REKETS since not one single person but many were the causes of our miseries And in this Name the Cause is put for the effect for that those men were the cause of our evils the evils are called by the Names of such who were the Causes of them The Effects of Original Sin are called the Old man in relation to Adam who was the fountain thereof Regeneration and Holiness called the New man directing unto Christ Jesus the worker of it in Holy Scripture by a Metonymy of the Cause put for the Effect Thus our unjust and usurping High Governors being by the Name of the Disease marked out unto us the Nature and Symptomes of the
is the effect and fruit of burning as we see in ashes of wood 2. for that salt whether it be taken inwardly or applied outwardly causeth a sense of burning We use to say As salt as fire understanding so salt as if we were burnt with it as with fire Touching the continuance of the Pains of Hell Salt signifieth that also for the property of salt is to keep from corruption and decaying In which sense the phrase of Holy Scripture is a Covenant of salt signifying a Covenant which is never to be broken but to endure for ever The Lake of Sodom the moniment of Gods vengeance upon those sinsul Cities Sodom and Gomorrha and the Cities about them is used by the Holy Ghost as a Type of Hell the place and condition of the damned and called the Lake of Fire burning with Brimstone Rev. 19. 20. because in that lake called the Dead Sea and Asphaltitis is found much 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Latine Bitumen which by the Poet Ovid is shewn to be a matter apt to take fire and unquenchable though by him distinguisht from Brimstone and is a pitchy substance known to Apothecaries although in some place it is by the Interpreters of the Bible called Slime Gen. 14. 10. it is called by another Hebrew word and by a Greek word so interpreting it Brimstone Deut. 29. 23. and in the above-named place in the Revelation Ovids words make it of the nature of Brimstone notwithstanding Metamorph. Book 14. Lurida supponunt faecundo Sulphura fonti Incenduntque cavas fumante Bitumine venas Blew-burning Brimstone's cast into the Spring And smoaking Earth-pitch fires the veins within This place as it is a Figure of Hell in respect of the matter of unquenchable fire contained in it being a remainder of that Brimstone which being kindled fell from Heaven and destroyed those Cities and so likewise was it a Type of Hell in relation to the saltnesse of that Lake called also the Salt-sea being so exceeding salt that no living creature is found therein as it were painting unto us the Duration of their Torments and their bodies preserved from Corruption All the qualities of this Lake for which it is by God Almighty constituted a Modle of Hell are not necessarily to be reckoned up but some of them are sufficient to have been exprest to instruct and direct us while the other are not mentioned that we may take pains to search after them For thus we finde in an expression of that Lake Brimstone sometimes left out of the description and only Fire mentioned Rev. 20. 14. And death and hell were cast into the Lake of Fire But of the Saltnesse of that place and as to a Punishment it is confirmed Deut. 29. 23. And that the whole land thereof is Brimstone and Salt and Burning that it is not sowen nor beareth nor any grasse groweth therein like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrha Admah and Zeboim which the Lord overthrew in his anger and in his wrath I might take a view of some other things pertaining to this disease of the Leprosie wherein some other matters are pointed at but what I have already spoken will be enough to denote what it typifies in the Nature of Sin and the Punishment But the great thing which was intended by this strange disease and for which cause it was sent and when that was come ceased to be any more and the chief Scope unto which the Leprosie by the Wisedom of the Lord aimed was his Son Christ Jesus which was then to come the Leprosie the Shadow Christ the Substance And as when the Body comes the Shadow thereof gives place in like manner when our Lord and Saviour had suffered the pains of death for the sins of the world and made us clean being our High-priest from our uncleannesse so many as he ordained to eternal life whom he pronounced clean as a good and skilful Priest saying Joh. 13. 10. You are clean but not all then afterward began the Leprosie quickly after his death to depart For the chief thing which was signified by the Leprosie was now come and the Mystery sulfilled our Priest was come and made us clean For now no such Leprosie found in Palestina nor any where among the nation of the Jews And the Ceremonies and Rites used in cleansing the Leper do point out our Saviour and what he did and suffered for us In the Cleansing of a House healed of the Leprosie use was made of two living Birds Cedar-wood Scarlet and Hyssop one of which birds was to be killed over running water in an earthen vessel and dipping the living bird the Cedar-wood Scarlet and Hyssope in the blood of the slain bird and in the running water and sprinkling the House seven times it is said Lev. 14. 52. that with all the fore-named things the Priest shall cleanse the House and ver 53. But he shall let go the living bird out of the city into the open fields and make an atonement for the House and it shall be clean Who to whom God hath given but an ordinary understanding willl not acknowledge here that the shedding of the blood of one bird and the other let fly into running water and in an earthen vessel into running water as to go into the Sea whither all running water is carried and all rivers run to be conveyed all the world over for from thence come all fountains did signifie so much touching the shedding of our Saviours blood for all the world Or who can then doubt that the receiving of it in an earthen vessel did betoken our Saviours taking our flesh upon him whose bodies as his being originally from the earth are called earthen vessels Nor can we gainsay the flying away of the other bird one of the same kinde did declare our Saviours resurrection and ascension into Heaven as birds are called fowls of Heaven It will certainly be granted that the Cedar signified two things his Cross as it is a tree on which he suffered death and the excellency of his person above all other men as the Cedar in loftinesse excelleth all trees And eminent men are metaphorically by the Prophet called Cedars Ezek. 17. 3. 22 31. and by the Holy Penman 2 King 14. 9. The Scarlet being lambs wool so died figured his innocent patient and bloody death But the Hyssope a low shrub growing upon the wall as Scripture calleth it and in a relation of Solomons History of Trees is opposed unto the Cedar the lowest to the highest and in the Ceremonials appointed in cleansing the leprous House being joyned to the Cedar pointeth at our Saviour Jesus Christ in his humility who humbled himself to take our trail nature upon him yea the form of a servant descending from heaven and disrobing himself of his transcendent glory With this dipt in blood of the Paschal Lamb were the lintels and two side-posts of the Israelites doors to be sprinkled for ever Exod. 12. 22 23 24. And a sponge filled with
last words of Ailredus Ammirantibus qui aderant tantam c. declaring that those which saw this cure performed by the King were thereupon amazed seeing so strange an effect do argue that this kinde of cure was not performed by any other King before nor by himself until this time And to this Prince Tagautius a French Writer ascribes the first cure of this disease in such manner in England Institution Chirurg lib. 1. In the next place let us consider the Nature of the Kings-evil which is a Malady most like to the Disease in Isaiah spoken of before consisting in Bruises and putrified and corrupt Sores and to this we may joyn the other part of the Description in Wounds also For what are those apostemous Swellings in this Disease but of the nature of Bruises which contain corrupt blood or 〈◊〉 in them And nothing more common in the Disease then Corrupt and Mattury Ulcers And wounds are properly taken for solution of continuity as Physicians call it without sanics or corruption and from an outward cause so the word here expounded wounds signifies such a solution of continuity and is a part of the disease of that state not of sin but of suffering from cruel men and unjust as in this disease of the Kings-evil where the swellings if the bones be rotten or the corruption cannot otherwise easily break out are oftentimes wounded by the Chirurgians knife Thirdly We are to consider more accurately the Person to whom the Lord first gave this great Gift of Healing the Kings-evil First in respect of his DIGNITY and DESCENT Secondly in regard of his ORDER and PLACE of SUCCESSION Thirdly in the addition of his new SIR NAME Fourthly In respect of his ADVENTURES For all which in few words this may suffice First he was by his DIGNITY King of England and by his DESCENT King Edward III before the Conquest was the natural and legitimate son of Egelred which Egelred was the son of King Edgar and yonger brother unto King Edward II who for that he was innocently murdered by the counsel of his Stepmother as is supposed Queen Alfrith after that he had reigned King a very short time was sirnamed the Martyr according to Ailredus in the said History pag 409. speaking thus Aâ—â—rat interim boati regis martyris Edwardi hujas nostre pricipis patrui praeclara solemnitas qui ab impiis sine culpâ percâ—â—ptus creditur innocentiae martyriâ— coronatus that is to say It was upon the great Feast day of S. Edward King and Martyr Uncle to our Soveraign that now is who for that he was causlesly murdered by wicked 〈◊〉 is beleeved to have received the crown of martyrdome for his innocence Thus much for this K. Edwards DIGNITY and DESCENT who first of our English Kings healed the KINGS-EVIL Secondly for what concerns this King Edward in his ORDER and PLACE of SUCCESSION he being the brothers son as was abovesaid to Edward the Martyr was notwithstanding the Fifth King in ORDER and COURSE of reigning from the former Edward taking both terms inclusively and accounting those Kings which reigned together for one and by the name of one of which Holy Scripture affords us more then one example Thus Edward the Martyr the First Egelred the Second Edmund Ironside the Third Hardicanutus the Fourth Edward the Confessor the Fifth Thirdly for his new SIRNAME the CONFESSOR that he was ordinarily called Edward the Confessor and for his HOLINESSE witnesseth Henry Knighton Canon of Leicester in his first book ch 8. De Eventibus Anglia Iste supradictus rex sanctus Confessor dictus est Edwardus III saith he that is This holy King Edward III was named the Confessor Whereunto adde the words of the Chronicle attributed unto John Brompton Abbot of Jereval pag. 956. of the Edition 1652. Iste rex Edwardus ab infantiâ deum diligens bonas consuetudines suas primarias pro honore terreno non commutavit fed cunctis diebus magis ac magis omni sanctitate casitute humilitate munditiâ Deum sanctam Ecclesiam dilexit panperesque ob amorem Dei tanquam fratres suos charos habuit dilectos nos largis elecmosynis aperto corde voluntate bona saepe respexit plures in Angliâ statuit leges bonas quae pro majari parte adhac in regno tenentur Which in English is This King Edward the Confessor from his childehood fearing God did not change his wonted goodnesse for earthly honour but daily encreased in all kinde of sanctity chastity humility and purity loving God and holy Church and such was his love toward God that he loved the poor tenderly accounting them his brethren and bestowing large and continuall almes upon them in singlenesse of heart and true affection and enacted more good laws in England then were before which for the most part are of force in the kingdome at this day Fourthly In what pertains to King Edward the CONFESSORS ADVENTURES he was by reason of an Usurper forced to shift for himself and to live as a banished man in Normandy for so writes Ailredus De Sancto Edwardo Confessore ac Virgine pag. 366. in the forenamed Volume of Historians Edwardus frater Edmundi filius Edelredi qui in Normanniâ exulabat that is Edward the brother of Edmund Ironside who lived in Normandy in Banishment From which place of his exile he was sent for by the testimony of the History called John Bromptons Abbot of Jerevall not written but set out by him Edwardus à Normanniâ vocatus King Edward saith the Historian was sent for out of Normandy But how welcome the King was and to whom Let us hear the words of Ailredus in the place aforesaid Veniens igitur in Angliam Edwardus ab universo clero populo cum maximâ exultatione suscipitur But when King Edward came into England saith he he was welcomed by all the Clergy and People of the land with all expressions of joy and some of the reasons of that great and universal gladness are in the same place exprest by the same Ailredus in this manner Homo mansuetus magis pace quà m armis regnum protegens habebat animum irae victorem avaritia contemptorem superbiae expertem which is He was a milde Prince who defended his Kingdom more by peace then by war of such a frame of minde that he could bridle his anger hated covetousness and was void of all prids Now I shall by Gods grace shew unto you in what manner it hath pleased Almighty God out of these Two Diseases the REKETS and KINGS-EVIL to foreshew unto us our Publike SINS and MISERIES and the AUTHORS of them and DELIVERANCE from them in One and the SINS we have been publikely guilty of and our MISERIES which we have within these twenty years undergone with the PERSON who shall by GODS mercy deliver and set us free from these long and miserable afflictions in the Other KING CHARLES II our DELIVERER Of which
not so they are not only Persecutors of the Church themselves but all their subjects follow their Princes example a great part therefore of such matters which the Lord is pleased to premonish his people of whether good or evil is joyned with the Persons and Princes which shall be principal authors of such things This is manifest in Nebuchadnezzars first and second Vision and in many of Daniels wherein are foreshewn the different estates of the Four Monarchies in respect of their Princes and by Ezekiel chap. 1. in the Vision of the Four living Creatures with four Faces applied distinctly unto the Church how those Princes of the Four Monarchies should exercise their authority toward the Jews their Subjects and Captives Insomuch that not only Josias was fore-named who should be a Pious and Excellent Prince unto the Jews near three hundred years before his birth but Cyrus also a heathen Prince who should be Gods Shepherd to help and cherish his people many years before he was born pointing and shewing them as with the finger a King who contrary to the nature of other Princes should send them home freely out of their captivity assisting them in whatsoever they could desire So it is not without example that a Prince should be designed by name if otherwise by some way equivalent to a name it will be the same thing to some great work some ages before he was Now having laid a strong foundation as I suppose for what follows concerning the Matter which I have before affirmed to have been comprehended in the two forenamed Diseases the REKETS and KINGS-EVIL I come at length to make good my assertion by making it by Gods grace appear to a judicious and competent Reader to be altogether true And first of all it will be needful that I describe unto you the Disease at large with the necessary circumstances thereunto belonging The Description of the REKETS THe REKETS is a Disease so strange and which is therefore to be wondred at that it was not heard of in our fathers times but began in our memory and not many years ago and in that part of the Kingdom according to the report of the most diligent Searchers and learned Writers thereof the Authors De Rachitide which is most healthful either Dorset or Somersetshire not in London nor in a Marish countrey Neither did this New Disease arise from contagion at first nor doth it now as the Venereous doth For no Countrey was found infected with this malady until England was seizing upon young infants not in the womb not until nine ot ten moneths of age lest any man should suspect it might arise from the infection of their parents Nor doth this Malady accrue by default of the nurse nor by evil attendance for it layeth hold wheresoever it pleaseth Almighty God on rich and poor even where greatest care is had and spareth as often such as are much or altogether neglected To finde out the Cause of which disease the Physicians have most diligently lookt about from one Cause to another so much and so far as to the stars but seldome higher till at the length they acknowledge They lose themselves And now I proceed to the DESCRIPTION of the REKETS at the full from the First and Pathognomik Signe thereof through each degree unto the utmost extent of the same not as it is in every single Patient affected with the REKETS but taken collected and put together from all and every childes Symptomes which is troubled therewith The REKETS is a disease laying hold on yong children about nine or ten moneths old in which the Childes HEAD is always OVER-GREAT for when other Symptomes are wanting which notwithstanding is seldome or never that One is never absent while the REKETS are present I proceed to the other Signes all of which are rarely missing together or if haply onely in the beginning of the sicknesse With the Head the FACE of the childe hath an appearance of SOBER GRAVITY much differing therein from the looks of other children The NOSE which is the ordinary Purging place of the Head and Brain is dry without distillation of Rheum in those children and is UNPURG'D Those children which lye under this Infirmity are of much more WIT and UNDERSTANDING then others of so small age The TEETH of them if they were first sound turn all ROTTEN and fall away or else they TOOTH very LATE The ARM-BONES become CROOKED The WRIST-JOYNTS and ANCLE-JOYNTS grow KNOPPY called DOUBLE-JOYNTS The FLESH of the whole BODY is PINED The BELLY appears OVERGROWN The RIBS toward the Breast are found VERY THICK and the EXTUBERANCIES named KNOTS The SHIN-BONES of these children RISE very HIGH and appear SHARP HIGH in the MIDDLE and DECLINING ABOVE and BENEATH Their THIGH-BONES and LEG-BONES are CROOKED The BREAST like in shape for sharpness to the BREAST of a FOWLE and KEELE of a SHIP The use of their FEET although when they were yonger they could walk is TAKEN AWAY Lastly not onely their stature by the bending of their Leg and Thigh-bones is shortened but their GROWTH is HINDRED The REMEDIES vulgarly commended against the REKETS I Shall not have any thing to do here with those various Remedies which have been invented against this disease Nor indeed is it easie to set down the greatest part of them many of which and of the best of that sort are compiled in that Learned Treatise De Rachitide But I shall reckon up such Remedies as as are Empirical and go current among the people universally nothing depending upon Reason and Experience together as others do although these also have had their influence upon and gotten credit I know not for what cause among the learned also Of this sort are Three in Number 1. REMEDY is SWINGING such children from side to side TOSSING them UP and DOWN and Turning them TOPSEY TURVEY 2. LIFTING the sick children up by the ARMS 3. Letting them BLOOD BEHINDE the EARE So much at present for the DESCRIPTION of the REKETS and REMEDIES I come now to the other Disease called the KINGS-EVIL the REKETS answering to EVERY SICK HEAD the KINGS-EVIL to the WOUNDS BRUISES and PUTRIFYING SORES described in the fore-named place by Isaiah Which later Disease is not wonderful in it self I confesse for what nation is there which is not and hath not been troubled with that disease which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Latines Struma and Scrofulae but how many nations are there whose Kings have such a Divine vertue given unto them that with the Touch of their Hands they can heal this Evil beside the KINGS and QUEENS of ENGLAND and the FRENCH KING This power God hath bestowed neither upon any Prince nor private person beside Which cure is performed at this time by our ROYALL SOVERAIGNS HANDS he truly acknowledging in the rite of healing GOD to be the AUTHOR thereof in these words I TOUCH and GOD HEALS For as the former Disease the REKETS is a
wonderful Disease in its Nature this is much more to be wondred at in the CURE What notable Cures have been done in QUEEN ELIZABETHS time by her Royal Hand reade the Learned Treatise of D. Tooker de Charismate Sanationis Let those which doubt hereof which I know some do which nevertheless love and honour the King repair to the Court with his Majesties leave and there behold multitudes toucht by his Royall Hands and comparing the condition of such who have been toucht afterward with what it was before shall finde this vertue ascribed to his Majesty true and so resolve their doubts Yet what doth this wonderful Remedy work in the mindes of those which behold and feel it more then wonder and astonishment Doth it cause any other effect in the most wise and learned Certainly it doth not only they account the utmost of the thing to be a singular blessing to our Nation whose King God hath indued above other Princes with such a blessing to his subjects But we know that miraculous mercies have been Signal also else the raising of the dead man by the touch of Elisha's dead body 2 King 13. 21. and the restoring of life unto the childe of the Shunnamite by him had not been wrought but to shew the vertue of Christs death and the applying of Christ unto us who are dead in sins as the Prophet joyned his own unto the childes body 2 King 4. 34. although they were mercies withall Moreover it encreaseth the wonder of our Kings Gift of Healing that his power extends not so far as to heal all other diseases like as the Struma why not the Feaver the Gout Palsie c. and that all Patients and why every one receive not benefit by his Royal Hands All this must of necessity cause wonder in those that consider all this even to astonishment But wonder never was the utmost end for which the Lord at any time did send his Miracles which indeed is nothing more than an inthralling and captiving of the understanding and reason that it can move no farther which comes short in us of the end which the Lord aims at in his marvellous works Much less doth wonder distinguish one work from another Our Saviour did his Miracles to shew and make them know he was the promised Messias which when they saw all men as the Evangelist tels us marvelled But did this effect answer the end which the Lord intended thereby Plainly it did not Much less doth astonishment and amazement at the sight of the Lords mighty and strange works make any the least difference between them but that one Answer must be given of them all as I wonder at these strange things or God knows what they mean Admiration indeed is the way which God hath ordained for men to look up for a higher Workman than ordinary as when a man is led into a maze or labyrinth he is taught by nature to seek a way out which needs must be the Author of so great a matter and as the work it self is not light and vulgar that is wrought so must it be for some extraordinary end which ought to be sought out The wondring at these two Diseases hath seized upon many but it hath pleased Almighty God of his meer mercy to make known unto me the Causes why they were sent his love unto King Charles II and his Pity toward the long distressed people of England by the Gracious and Happy Government of our Royal Master For what am I in knowledge or learning more nay I am less then others that I should attribute the knowledge of these Mysteries to my self But in a time of great wickedness and affliction in a time of the sadness of my heart presently after the Lord had delivered me from a sickness past hope of recovery about ten years since which is not hard to prove the Lord made this known unto me Blessed be his Holy Name so that there is nothing altered in the Interpretations saving that of late some few things have by Gods Grace been added as an enlargement But that I may finde out the signification of the second Disease the KINGS-EVIL it will be necessary that it be enquired whether the cure of this Disease hath alwaies been performable by our Kings of England and if not who and what he was who first of our English Kings had this Gift of Healing given unto him as it is called the Disease of the KINGS-EVIL for being cured by the King The Gift of healing the Struma now called the KINGS-EVIL we shall finde to have been given by the Lord first of all Kings of England to King Edward III before the Conquest commonly named Edward the Confessor by the following words of Ailredus Abbot of Revesby De Vita Miraculis Edwardi Confessoris among the ten English Historians printed at London for Cornelius Bee 1652. page 390. Adolescentula quaedam nuptiis tradita duplici laborabat incommodo nam faciem ejus morbus deformaverat amorem viri sterilitas prolis ademerat Sub faucibus quippe quasi glandes ei succreverant quae totam faciem deformi tumore faedantes putrefactis sub cute humoribus sanguinem in saniem vertebant indè nati vermes odorem teterrimum exhalabant A little after he annexeth this which follows Jubetur autem in somnis adire Palatium ex Regiis manibios sperare remedium quibus si lota si tacta si signata foret reciperet ejus meritis sanitatem In English thus A very yong woman which was married was afflicted with two infirmities for her face was not only disfigured by a Disease but she was barren also which drew away the affection of her husband from her For under her jaws there grew a sort of kernels which by their swelling made her look deformedly and the humours corrupting under her chin turned her blood into mattur which breeding worms sent forth a very stinking savour At length she was warned in a dream to go to the Court and that the King should cure her so that if she were washt stroak'd and sign'd by the Kings hands she should receive a perfect cure by the Kings merits Then this Author declaring her repair to King Edwards Court and likewise the performance by the King in the Ceremony of what was desired adjoyns to his former Discourse that which follows Subitò ruptâ cute cum sanie vermes ebulliunt resedit tumor dolor omnis abscessit ammirantibus qui aderant tantam sub purpurâ sanitatem tantam Sceptrigeris manibus inesse virtutem that is All on the sudden the skin breaks the worms and mattur drop out the swelling fals all the pain goes away all that stood by being amazed to see such a cure to be performed in Royal Robes and such vertue to proceed from hands which held a Sceptre For not only the mention of healing the Struma in this manner is first found in the History of King Edward and the praise thereof attributed to him but those
troubled therewith and the significations of them so far as the Lord hath enabled me I have also examined the Name of the Disease and found out the Mystery thereof but although the REKETS be the general name to all degrees and sorts of this Malady yet when the diseased are troubled with such JOYNTS and RIBS as they call DOUBLE this they call the TENT See Arnoldus Bootius in libello De Affectibus Omissis in Cap. De Tabe Pectoreâ If you then ask me What means this Name I answer By a Metonymy of the Adjunct it signifyeth and expresseth Souldiers and Armies For Castra the Latine word by interpretation Tents among the Romans is very often put to express an Army or Armies in the Field where Tents were used as among the Holy Writers Tents are put for Habitations and Houses because in former times the Israelites dwelt in Tents and sometimes Shepberds dwellings because their habitations in the Fields were constantly such But because among us here is no use of Tents but in time of War it must signifie naturally according to its Name and doth confirm that such Joynts were in signification a combining of Generals and Commanders with Souldiers of Parl. with Souldiers and Fortifying by Lands with Soldiers and though by Sea there is no use of Tents yet the Denomination is given to all for the outward likeness of the Types although proper but to Two of them and that not without example as the Crown and Sceptre are used in speech when by them we mean nothing but a Kingdome Thus the Wise God knoweth every word in our Tongues and when men or women give names to things they know not what nor why doth oftentimes so overrule them that they speak the Truth in a Mystery So did the High-Priest not knowing what he spake prophesy of our Saviour The MYSTERY of the THREE GENERAL REMEDIES AFter the Mystery of the REGETS and TENT and of each SYMPTOME thereof the three forenamed Vulgar REMEDIES are not without their Mystery The first Remedy is SWINGING such children from side to side and TOSSING them up and down and TURNING them Topsey Turvey This is ordinarily taken to be and used as a Remedy against that Disease but careful observation and experience teacheth the contrary that it is vain Thus for a Remedy against our evil Regents we were promised when we should change from a Kingdom to a Common-wealth we should have all amended But that then failing we were made to beleeve how such a Protector would indeed perform what others had promised and when he had deceived we must have a piece and the worst piece of a House of Commons to over-rule us who pleaded the Justice of their own cause as the rest did although the people never received Justice from any of them And was not this Tossing England from side to side and up and down When we were sometime under a King and Parliament we were up when we were subject to a Few or One of our Fellow-Subjects we were down At last we were turned Topsey Turvey when the Heels the Souldiers possest the place and RULE of our Superiors the King and Parliament And this was a False Remedy The Second REMEDY is the Lifting up such sick children by the Armes The meaning of which thing will by Gods grace be understood if we remember in what sense I declared to you from Holy Scripture and the reason thereof Armes are to be taken which is in signification of Armies This Remedy Lifting the sick children up by the Armes is a False Remedy and never used with success But it is much to be observed that above all other Remedies which are wont to be applied to such children there are none so much abhorred by them as this for when it is done they will complain and cry out The Mystery hereof is that when the childe of England should be lifted up by the Armes at which time the weight of the body depends upon the Armes that is the Armies and at that time the Armes also are lifted up and lifting up signifieth raising to honor Psal 113. 7. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill ver 8. That he may set him with Princes even with the Princes of his people The poor Patients which were troubled with the Regents would least of all endure and most of all complain against the Tyranny of the Soldiers and Army bearing rule that is the Lifting up by and of the Armes This was fulfilled to the utmost when the Agitators of the Army pluckt and threw out of the Parliament house that Piece remaining and left of the Whole House of Commons and for a short space under the greatest indignation of the people ruled alone The Third REMEDY generally famous but False is the letting of the diseased children Blood Behinde the Ear. And how true it hath been in the Antitype that the Head our Royal Head our Dear Lord the KING should for a pretended cure of our miseries be let blood behinde the Eare that is in the Neck by cutting off his Head to the encrease of our miseries I abhorre to think and much the more because it was plotted and acted by men which were Professors of the austerest religion But let not the Profession of Religion be branded for this cause Were not those that had the chiefest hand in our Lord Christs death one of his Disciples and the Priests Is not he that hath been guilty of so much of the blood of the Saints that the City of Rome is become drunk therewith counted the most Holy Father the Pope and with him the Fathers of the Clergy This is the craft of the old Serpent when he cannot destroy the Church by open enmity to endeavour it by seeming friends But for the real Cure and true REMEDIES of the Disease we call the REKETS as we take it according to the letter it may for good cause be accounted wonderful in that regard also and therein like unto the Leprosie The Leprosie was a Disease not curable by any Art or Power of man For thus answereth Ahab unto the King of Syria who sent unto him desiring that he would heal his servant Naaman of the Leprosie concluding the curing of that Disease to be a Divine work above mans strength 2 King 5. 7. Am I God to kill and to make alive that this man doth send to me to recover a man of his Leprosie To which purpose and more plainly speaketh our Saviour Luk. 4. 27. Many Lepers were in Israel in the time of Elizeus the Prophet and none of them was cleansed saving Naaman the Syrian Even so neither is the malady of the Rekets curable by any Art or Physician upon the Earth although I doubt not all men both Learned and unlearned beleeve the contrary perswaded from what they see that divers children afflicted very much with this Disease at length become found and perfect But although it cannot
called the seventh from Adam Jude 14. in which place son is to be understood For Henry VII is the First Margarite his daughter Q to James IV. King of Scotland the Second James V the third Mary Q. of Scotland his daughter the Fourth James VI King of Great Britain the fifth King Charles I the sixth K. Charles II the seventh And this is a good Argument to prove that King Charles II the seventh of a sea earth is not to be understood so to cure the Kings-evil as in a literal sence which some of these and more of his Predecessors have done but in some speciall and mystical way as I have declared And this computation agrees in another account if we reckon by the daughter of Queen Margarite and her issue for Queen Margarite daughter to King Henry VII first married to King James IV had issue James V after married to Archibald Douglas Earl of Angus by him had issue Margarite As King Henry VII the first Margarite Queen to King James IV the second Margarite her daughter by Archibald Earl of Angus and Wife to Matthew Stuart Earl of Lenoix the third Henry Lord Darley her son husband to Mary Queen of Scotland the fourth King James his son King of Great Britain the fifth King Charles I the sixth King Charles II the seventh For which cause I do humbly beseech the Kings Majesty that a Law may be enacted by the King and his Parliament for the deserved punishment of such diabolical impostures as this is which is frequently committed in this land by seventh sons taking upon them the Royal Prerogative of our Kings with the touch of their hands to cure the Kings-evil For the practice here of tends much to the dishonour of God and of our good King and to the delusion of his Majesties Subjects But one thing more touching the Rekets must not be forgotten that is to say the time when that Disease first seized upon Children in this Kingdome and had that name of Rekets given unto it It was the third year after our Royall Soveraigns Nativity or the next unto it when the weekly Bill of Mortality mentioned one to have been buried of the Rekets in the Moneth of May and no mention thereof in any of the said Bils before that time As I have found by search in the Parish Clerks Register kept in their Hall For as the time when Darius took the Babylonian Kingdom is exprest Dan. 5. 31. to be when he was about threescore and two years old that the Jews might observe as judiciously H. Broughton hath noted upon that place that at the time they were carried into captivity which was about the time of Darius his birth the Jews might then know the Lord had a Deliverer born for them So the Nation of England may learn Gods special care that he did not send them the Disease of the Rekets till He was born who should free them from the Miserie 's signifyed thereby and from the Disease it self Hitherto of the Kings-Evil as it pertaineth to the King and Kingdom of England Whereas I said The sins and calamities of this Nation with the Causers of them were pointed at by the Name and Disease of the Rekets and not the Name of our Deliverer but in the other the Kings-Evil yet notwithstanding it doth appear who shall be our Deliverer albeit not in the Name of the Disease or the Symptomes of the Rekets yet in the quality of the Persons which are troubled therewith The Patients so afflicted are Children and no other partly but not principally that we might be left without all pretence of any other inferior cause but be constrained to look up to the Hand which hath smitten us and yet we will not but in despight of reason seek about after this and that cause most vainly Again partly it is to let us understand that the afflictions foreshewn thereby should fall upon the childe of God Thirdly and principally the Rekets is laid on children that by the quality of the person afflicted by it it being the childs disease we may understand him that shall free us from it and what is signified thereby As it is called the Kings-evil not because it is caused by or laid upon but cured by the King So is it called and to be called the Childes disease because a childe shall heal it Surely you will ask me What childe We finde in Holy Scripture that our Saviour hath called himself barely by the name of the Son If the Son shall make you free saith our Savior you shall be free indeed And since we finde that God doth communicate his own Name to Princes calling them Gods and hence it seems to have been first used among Princes to name themselves in the plural number though single by the word we and us imitating as it were the Lord Almighty who is One and Three he doth seem to express by this word the childes Disease the Disease of the childe above all other children the childe a son of the King After which manner the son and daughter of the King of Spain is called infante and infanta that is the son and daughter childe as being well enough exprest alone to understand what son and daughter is meant thereby So when we say the childes Diseases 〈◊〉 may be well understood that Disease which the Childe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 above all children that is the Kings son shall heal In which expression of childe is also shewn first that our King shall be when this is done a childe albeit not according to the vulgar use of the word in our English tongue yet according to the signification of that word which in the Hebrew signifieth sometimes a childe in years else where a yong man although not very properly by the Translators rendred also a childe where in Daniel it signifieth a yong man calling the three companions of Daniel three children that he shall then be yong in years How great a matter of comfort is hereby administred unto us that are the people of the land that the Lord is so pleased that the King shall not differ the making us a happy nation to his old age but go about it and perfect the Lords work while he is yong Secondly here is an Argument of Almighty Gods great Power and Mercy that he should frame his Majesties heart to clemency as not to suffer him although his Royal Father was murthered to break out in cruel and unjust revenge It is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our eyes And lest any man should thus object This Disease of the Rekets is common to women children as well as to men as that it should not seem thereby to point at a cure to be performed by the King in regard of the sex as to be performed by the son more than the daughter of a King let him take a view of those great Types of our Savior the Prophets whereof although the most part were men yet
Ancestors who were called Lords and Kings thereof but charge and trouble beside a bare Title But to her was the Kingdom conquer'd and quieted that as the Author of the History called Pacata Hibernia in the Epistle to the Reader speaks Q. Elizabeth might have it justly written upon her Tomb Pacata Hibernia or Ireland Tamed But our Royal Soveraign is doing more and hath begun it already and suffered longer and worse than ever Queen Elizabeth did Yet not thou O Charles but God which is in thee Secondly If we consider his Majesties Constancy and Patience in the mids of his great Tentations Shall K. Charles II who was by wicked men banished from his own Kingdome forced to remain in the Dominions of a Popish Prince such a King who by no Necessities nor Sollicitations could be drawn to forsake God to advance himself shall he I say be miraculously preserved in his escape from his cruel hunters and more miraculously in France and Flanders from Idolatry and only be kept to make us happy God forbid Had not Joseph whose bow abode in strength whom the archers sorely grieved shot at and hated Genes 49. 23 24. a double portion to him and his posterity Ezek. 47. 13. having one portion for that cause above his brethren given him by his father taken out of the hand of the Amorite with the sword and with his bowe Gen. 48. 22. But our Soveraigns bowe abode as much and more in strength when for the sollicitations of the Egyptian Romish harlot he started not aside Beside in the very letters of their names there is a parity between the Type and Antitype and this sometime happeneth not by chance but providence as when Mary Aarons Sister a virgin and Jesus Moses successor prefigured in deed and names the virgin Mary and Jesus our Savior betwixt Clovis and C and Clovis as to note those great evils shall be taken away when C and Lovis meet as now they do Concerning the Healing of the Kings-Evil in France and what is prefigured thereby thus far If any of my Readers shall object which doubtless most will do that what I do presage touching our Royal Soveraign and the Kingdom of France is no more then probable to him I will be bold to say and let him well consider that even among the Sages of the Law great Probabilities have the esteem of Certainties and according thereunto Sentence is pronounced by them And we know that in the difference of the two Harlots about a surviving childe who should be the true mother thereof when King Salomon gave sentence on her side who shewed pity toward the Infant as to be mother thereof judgement thus given from probable conjecture is said to be the Wisedom of God in him 1 King 3. 28. Or are our children known to be the fathers but by probability Yea although we are enjoyned to give diligence to make our calling and election sure how few of the elect ever attained to that height in this life that all his mis-doubtings were taken away and that he was fully assured of a future happinesse I must acknowledge that there are degrees of likeliness some things which are probable are not yet firm enough to conclude others of so high a degree of probability that according to the example commended by the Spirit of God in Solomon they are as strong as the clearest certainties And of that sort of probable things which are the strongest or very near them I here maintain these sore-named to be Thus much pertaining to the cure of the Struma performed by the French King and what is signified thereby And here at last it will not be unseasonable to explain what before was partly touch'd by me whence it is that neither our Soveraign nor yet the French King do heal of the Struma all that are touch'd by their hands 2. That they do not likewise help such as are troubled with the Gout Feavers Palsie c. but this Evil onely 3. Kings of this Kingdom and of the French nation although they have erred in the faith and have been of a false Church have healed this Disease as well as those which have been sound in the faith and members of that true Church of which Christ is Head in which small number our Royal Soveraign is one and a principal 4. That in some few although healed at present the foresaid disease through some occasion breaks out again In answer to the first Objection first acknowledging if the healing of this Evil were perfectly miraculous like unto those cures wrought by our Saviour it should be perfect in any of which our King should lay his Royal hands Joh. 7. 23. Are ye angry at me saith our Saviour because I made a man altogether whole upon the SÃ bbath day Then was there no unsoundness left behinde therefore we may conclude this power given unto our Kings was not for the same cause for which our Saviour and his Apostles healed the sick To the second Objection I confess that whereas our Saviour healed all that were sick and likewise the Apostles yea the Pool of Bethesda all with what infirmity soever they were troubled it was to signifie that which the Scripture elsewhere saith He healeth all thy Diseases that is all both outward and inward Diseases of which sort are sins specially Wherefore for some other distinct cause doth our Soveraign cure the Struma only Nevertheless it cannot be denied that this vertue given to our Kings is miraculous although not to perfection To the next Objection I say That even miracles themselves were wrought by the hands of the evil as well as the good sometimes For is it not written that at the last day some reprobates should say unto our Saviour Have we not in thy Name cast out devils And this was given unto them not as it was unto the Apostles who represented Christs person and were as in Christs stead so the gift of healing this Evil because it was given as a signe of what was to come so much as they were Types in being Kings of such a Kingdom was given to the evil as well as to the good Kings Thus to the last thing which is objected I say I cannot deny but to have known how some after a long continued soundness and being cured of their mattury ulcers have began to fall back into the same Disease and Symptomes but being touch'd again have recovered All which notwith standing doth not disprove the miraculous cure but pointeth at somewhat else therein Now to satisfie the first and second objection to the full Our Royal Soveraign doth not take away the Struma by that power which is given him from above because it is a great evil for there are greater which he cannot cure nor yet because it is a little one as if his vertue could extend it self to small Diseases for we know there are less which he cannot take away but for that this Disease which we call the Kings-evil is such a malady which is parallel to the things which are signified his Majesty shall help and other Diseases are not like them For what likeness is there in the Gout Feavers and Palsie to the bruises and putrid sores full of corruption of which Isaiah speaketh the corruption of Doctrine and manners leath some to the eyes and unsavory to the nostrils of God and man Erasmus though tormented with the Stone rejoyceth that he did not suffer under some disease which might make his presence leathed But the Kings-evil we know hath bruises and putrid sores full of corruption This Malady therefore the Providence of God did make choice of to demonstrate what sins and afflictions our Royal Soveraign through Gods mercy will cure not for it self nor for the sick Patients sakes but for the cause of that which being most like unto it was to be taken away Nor is it done to perfection in all some being remediless which are touch'd that we may know that corruption in justice unsoundness in faith and doctrine shall not and cannot be so universally taken away by our Good King but that some do what he can tares and wicked men will continue among the wheat and good men And touching the last Objection where it is said that some which have been healed of this Evil have relapsed it doth indeed plainly inferr that this healing of the Evil by our Kings must be in that respect different from the like miracles of old The smiting of the rock twise by Moses was his sin as if the doing of it once had not been sufficient and the virtue of causing the water to flow out of the rock had been in his hand If once touching by the Royal hand be not ever and altogether sufficient for the cure and the second be helpfull it may well signifie that in this our good Josiahs reformation men shall not be so fully reformed as that none shall endeavour to fall back again but yet by his Royal hand they shall be reduced A PRAYER In the mean time let us beseech Almighty God to plant in our Soveraigns Heart the awful Fear of his Holy Name and that his unerring Word may be the Measure and Rule by which alone Religion and Justice may be reformed as by Josiah his Royal Type was done Hasten him O Lord herein that thou mayest hasten to reward him with another Crown upon the earth and a Crown of Glory hereafter which is void of cares and fadeth not Make me O Lord and all his Subjects unfeignedly to love and honour him for thy sake and grant we may never forget what by woful experience we have found true the counsel of thy wise servant King Solomon My Son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with them which are given to change For their calamity shall rise suddenly and who knoweth the ruine of them both Amen Lastly of all which hath been spoken to God alone be given the Praise and Glory for from him and by him and to him are all things He revealeth the deep and secret things he knoweth what is in darkness and the light dwelleth with him For thine is the Power and the Glory and thou hast now made known unto us the Kings matter FINIS
Disease do pourtray unto us their cunning fraud combinations injustice cruelty with the rest of their eminent Sins In the Disease it self let us first consider the Pathognomik and most constant Signe and Symptome thereof which is the HEAD OVER-GREAT For the understanding whereof if we call to minde that in Holy Scripture a HEAD is a GOVERNOR or person chief in rule as where the Princes of the Tribes are stiled the Heads of the children of Israel Numb 13. 4. and when the Husband is named Head of the wife Eph. 5. 23. for Head in both Testaments is near seventy times set for the chief and for Rulers and that it is proper not only to the Hebrew but to the Greek and Latine nations and to our own language to call Magistrates and Rulers our Heads we will not I hope deny but that it is fitly enough exprest by the OVER-GREATNESS of the HEAD describing the OVER-GREATNESS of such men by assuming unto themselves and growing to so great POWER to have been the most certain and unremoveable cause of our late afflictions For much power is called great power where the Angels are stiled Greater in Power 2 Pet. 2. 11. By the Greatness of the head therefore is very aptly set out unto us the taking and gaining too-much power to have been the first and great cause of the misery which we have undergone from those which were set over us In the next place the SOBER GRAVITY of the FACE of such children comes to be examined and we may joyn thereunto the more then ordinary WIT and UNDERSTANDING found in such children far beyond what is found in others of that age This argues in what sense and signification head is to be taken that is in no other than as a HEAD of WISEDOME Counseil and GRAVITY this last being a discreet behaviour of a man such as may serve for the begetting of awe and reverence in inferiors that their governors be not despised and this is exprest in and mesnaged very much by the SADNESS of the COUNTENANCE Eccles 7. 5. Anger is better then laughter for by a sad look the heart is made better And whereas it is observed that the NOSES of such which are troubled with this Malady are UNPURGED remaining dry without distillation of Rheum which in other children abounds this is to let us understand that these our swelling heads which thus ruled over us although they seemed to cleanse themselves by removing Malignants which they named PURGING of the HOUSE again and again from sitting among them yet did not these Heads PURGE THEMSELVES from nor yet cast out from among them Malignity and Malignants but did notwithstanding retein in themselves their sins and vices such as least become a Court of Justice Oppression and Delay among many other less scandalous sins PURGING in the Scripture is casting away the FILTH of SIN 2 Tim. 2. 21. If any man saith Paul therefore purge himself from these he shall be a vessel unto honor From the Nose I come unto the TEETH which in such children become all ROTTEN and FALL out or else beyond the custome in other yong children they for a great space TOOTHE NOT. The Signification whereof that we may understand we are to consider that the TEETH are those Bones which God hath given unto us for grinding and CHEWING MEAT by which the body is nourished We likewise knowing that PREACHING of Gods word is termed FEEDING of Gods flock because thereby is administred unto the hearers FOOD for their SOULS for it keeps the soul by that profitable knowledge knowledge being hungred after by the soul as meat by the body from eternal death to everlasting life in feeding upon Christ by faith Well therefore may those PASTORS which prepare by breaking it after grinding in their mindes and hearts the Bread which came down from Heaven contained in the Holy Word be accounted and be typified by TEETH in which sense the same are to be understood Cant. 4. 2. Thy teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn which come up from the washing which all of them bear twins and Chap. 6. 5. Thy teeth are as a flock of sheep which go up from the washing whereof every one beareth twins and there is not one barren among them The TEETH of the CHILDE of GOD whereof the King is Head are the PREACHERS the ROTTEN TEETH are to be expounded such Ministers which being CORRUPT and UNSOUND in their LIVES DOCTRINE and FAITH unto all which the Holy Ghost in Scripture gives such names have been removed from the Church But NOT-TOOTHING and LATE-TOOTHING doth imply that SOUND PREACHERS which should painfully skilfully and uprightly prepare nourishment for the Body of Christ which is his Church should here in England be MUCH and LONG WANTING withdrawing and hiding themselves leaving the mouth empty as it were those places where they should be fixed as it hath proved most true also in the event because of unlawful oaths and engagements against their Sovereign to be laid upon them which with a good conscience they could not submit unto and for the like un just causes The ARM BONES of such children as labour of the REKETS turn CROOKED the Mystery whereof we shall finde by Scripture phrase ARMES in Gods Word noteth sundry times military Forces and ARMIES and this not without just reason in a fleshly arm men put their confidence and the strength thereof for by the strength of their arm they yield their sword for offence and defence The Armes of the wicked shall be broken saith David Psa 37. 17. and in armed men the strength multitude and valor of them Princes place their confidence In this sence Armes are to be taken where God speaking by his Propher and foretelling the destruction of the king of Egypts forces by the King of Babylons army nameth the forces and armies of them boâ—â— Armes Ezek. 30. 22. I will break his Pharaohs Arme and ver 24. And I will strengthen the arm of the King of Babylon Now let us search in the same place for the meaning of this word CROOKED Here we may finde that whensoever men once INTIRE and as it were STRAIGHT which figure in the limbs is the just and proper shape shall become by what means soever BOWED from their former STRAIGHTNESS and turn to be worse they are for this declining accounted and reputed CROOKED For which cause the Israelites are intitled a crooked generation Deut. 32. 5. and for the same cause the people of the Jews are by S. Paul who formerly had walked in the ways of the Lord uprightly which the Gentiles had not done meant where he saith Phil. 2. 15. In the midst of a naughty and crooked generation Hereby the Almighty and Just Lord by inflicting such CROOKED ARMES upon our children doth not only punish us mediately in the persons of them but would have us to be premonisht that by the Signe of CROOKED ARMES he was for our sins sending against us