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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43662	A letter to the author of a late paper, entituled, A vindication of the divines of the Church of England, &c. in defence of the history of passive obedience.	Hickes, George, 1642-1715.; Fowler, Edward, 1632-1714. A vindication of the divines of the Church of England.	1689 (1689)	Wing H1856; ESTC R34460	10,899	22

resistance all over and presupposes Injustice Oppression and Persecution in all degrees and I desire you to consider whether under a limited Monarchy there can be any occasion for it till Kings break their Oaths and violate their Laws and exercise Arbitrary power They must first invade the rights of the People before they can be called to the exercise of this Self-denying Doctrine We can never suffer till our Kings begin to rule in a way subversive of the Government nor ever suffer to any trying degree of Persecution till they set up illegal Courts or govern by the Sword. But perhaps you will say that single persons or families ought to suffer but not the Community To which I answer that the Community is made up of single persons and families and when one person or family or Corporation suffers Illegally in a common Cause the whole Community suffers with it and therefore to what purpose hath this Doctrine been so carefully taught by our Church and her Divines and You among the rest unless we are to submit to our Kings when they turn Tyrants and subvert the Laws Our Church and her Clergy hath all along taught the doctrine of Suffering with a particular eye to this very case if God to punish us for our sins should suffer our Kings to turn Tyrants therefore we must either absolutely disclaim it which you are unwilling to do or else suffer patiently against Law when there is no other remedy but Arms which neither our Religion nor the Law which makes it our Porperty allow In the 9 10. pag. you upbraid the Compilers of the History as you call a single Author with not assisting K. James and scoffingly ask them Why they did not at least mind the People of their duty and excite them to it Pray Sir did you do so or no If you did not the same reason that will justifie or excuse you will also justifie or excuse them Your Conscience tells you that neither you nor they then thought that the King couid have lost his Kingdoms and I must further tell you because you seem to pinch them with your question that several of them did at their great hazard remind their People of the duty of Non resistance and particularly the Author of this Book For tho' you are pleased to tell them that hazard ought not to discourage Ministers from a Necessary duty yet I must tell you that perhaps an Apostle is not bound to run the danger of such hazard and to so little purpose You cannot have forgot the rage and madness of the Rabble all over the Kingdom at that time and when the Papists shall equally upbraid both sides as you upbraid one with silently looking on then I believe you will think your common confidence that the King would not suffer by your silence and the terror of the Mob good topicks of excuse I find you p. 13. reviving the old distinction betwixt the Kings political capacity and his personal interest or person and thereby implying as the Spencers did in Edward the Second's time that it is lawful for the People to separate his Person from his Power and govern in default of him when he doth not govern according to Law. But then I must tell you that this Doctrine was solemnly condemned by two Parliaments one in Edward the Second and the other in Edward the Third's time It was also revived 50. Years ago and as solemnly condemened tho' not expresly yet in effect by two or three Acts of Parliament since the Restauration and I pray you to tell me as a Divine is it not the King's person his natural person that is anointed and which we are bound to honour and over which the Law tells us we have no coercive power and whose death it makes High Treason to compass or imagine as also to take up Arms against him and which in short was deposed in Richard the Second and murdered in Charles the First Give me leave also to tell you that you run from your Argument of Conquest in the attempt you have made to absolve us from our old Oath of Allegiance with this distinction and the welfare of the People which is called the highest Law. If Conquest will do what need of this Theory and if this will do what need of that but you do wisely in having two Strings for your Bow. You amaze me with your amazing providences pag. 14. Major-General Harrison argued at his Tryal just so and truly that way of arguing tho' now again in fashion becomes a Turk better than a Christian and a Fifth-Monarchy man much better than a Church of England Divine Had a Novice in Divinity argued so it might have been excusable but there is no excuse for such as you who it may be saw the amazing providences 50. Years ago and who must needs know that God permits many amazing things which he doth not approve For as he lets his Sun shine on the Good and on the Evil So he gives amazing successes to bad Princes and Causes witness the * According to that of the French Poet. Vna dies B os Burgundos hebdomas una Vna Lotharigos Luna Quid annus eris French victories as well as to the Good. I should remark some other Passages in your Book but that to use your own phrase there may be hazard in touching of them In answer to one of them I could refer you to an excellent saying in Dr. B.'s answer to Parl. Pac. and whereas you suppose in your last Paragraph that all who have taken the New Oath have transferred their Allegiance as you have done I must tell you if you know it not before that they do not think so And I beseech you to consider that the reason why so many good Men stand out is not that they are fond of K. James or expect more than you from him but because they cannot transfer their Allegiance with a quiet Conscience but when God shall take away that which lets then they will readily transfer it and become as good Liege-Subjects as you can desire them to be In the mean time Sir I hope you and all good Men will pity the inconsiderable number whose Consciences direct them against their interests and inclinations Two of them Learned and Holy Bishops have declared on their Death-Beds that if Death had been the Penalty of not taking the Oath they must have offered their Lives to redeem their Consciences They were good Men and good reasoners too and I hope their declarations if they were made publick would satisfie honest Men of all Perswasions that it is neither pride nor peevishness nor any other evil passion nor yet any worldly hopes or expectations but a full perswasion or just fear of Perjury that keeps others also from taking the Oath I also hope it will be considered of what Church they are Ministers what an Ornament many of them in their respective Relations have been unto it how constant they were to their Profession in the late time of tryal and how stoutly they stood with their Brethren in the breach These things and the hardness of their Case seem to call for pity from all good Church-men both among the Clergy Mr. B●●●un in a late piece intitled the Doctrine of Non-resistance c. p. 24. who pretends to be a good Church-man saith he hopes they will not meet with much compassion that is in his figure with none at all He hopes it because they are blind and wilful men but if he indeed be the Church-man he pretends to be I hope he will repent before his next offering both of the rashness of his judgment and the uncharitableness of his wish By what principle of the Church of England will he justify himself for sitting in judgment upon his Teachers and passing sentence of wilful blindness upon them to make them odious to the People Is this consistent with the reverence which the Church teaches to be due to the Fathers and Pastors of it Is it consistent with Christian Chrity to treat them as the Pagans treated their Predecessors the Apostles and Presbyters when they dressed them up in the Skins of Beasts and exposed them as the filth and off scourings of the World What have they done contrary to the Chruches Doctrine or the Example of their Predecessors or their own Principles to deserve this usage How comes he who not long since thought many of them so venerable for their Candor Learning and Judgment now to proclaim them blind and wilful and to wish so much evil to them to whom he much good If they are in an error it would have much better become his character and pretensions to have excused it and apologized for them and instead of making their Friends their Enemies to have made their Enemies their Friends Their punishment is like to be grievous enought without any accession he needed not have added affliction to the miserable but they trust in God who is able to do them more good than he can do them hurt and since he hath so frankly tole the World he hath no bowels for them he may be sure none of these blind men will ask Break at his Door But as blind as he thinks them they can look unto Jesus the Author and finisher of their faith and according to his Precepts and Example pray for those that despitefully use them and for him in particular that God may have more compassion for him than it seems he hath or is willing others should have for them All the ground of his displeasure against them is that they are afraid of Perjury a Sin which he himself sets forth as most detestable and dreadful in the IX Section of his Justice of Peace whither I refer him and the Readers especially those with whom he is so angry for not taking the Oath FINIS

A LETTER TO THE AUTHOR Of a late Paper Entituled A Vindication of the DIVINES of the Church of ENGLAND c. In DEFENCE of the HISTORY OF Passive Obedience Printed in the Year 1689. Books Printed for Jos Hindmarsh in Cornhill A Memorial to his Highness the Prince of Orange in Relation to the Affairs of Scotland together with the Address of the Presbyterian Party in that Kingdom to his Highness and some observations on that Address by two Persons of Quality Prerogative of Primogeniture shewing that the Right of an Hereditary Crown depends not upon Grace Religion amp c. but only upon Birthright and Primogeniture by David Jenner A Discourse of Monarchy more particularly of the Imperial Crowns of England Scotland and Ireland Majestas Intermerata or the Immortality of the King. A LETTER To the Author of a late Paper Entituled A Vindication of the Divines of the Church of Eng. c. In Defence of the History of PASSIVE OBEDIENCE SIR IT is the good fortuned of some Books to meet with such trivial Answers as mightily advance the esteem of them and I assure you Yours to the History of Passive Obedience is so very trifling that were it not for the real and it may be particular concern you shew in it on would think the Author of the History or some of his friends had written it on purpose to set off his Book You pass a severe Censure upon it in your first Paragraph but in the second you say you should not have so Censured it had it come abroad some considerable time before the first of August but since it came out so late you think it was the principal design of it to expose those Divines who have taken the Oath But Sir if it be so easie a Task as you make it in the third Paragraph to shew that the New Oath of Allegiance is no whit repugnant with the Doctrine of the most absolute Passive Obedience Why should you think so learned an Author should have so foolish a design I cannot believe he could be so silly as to think his History could make the world believe that the generality of our Divines are fallen under the guilt of Apostacy and Perjury if indeed it be so easie to prove that even those who have Skrew'd up the doctrine of Non-resistance to the very highest peg Page 5. Page 55. may lawfully take the Oath and transfer their Allegiance But to let that pass Sir how doth it appear that this was the Author's design It is hard to judge of mens Intentions beyond what they delare themselves and when the Author saith expresly he wrote the History for other reasons it was somewhat rash and uncharitable in a Divine to say that this was his apparent and principal design He tells you plainly enought in his Preface he wrote his History against four sorts of men First against those who ridiculed the doctrine of Passive Obedience Secondly against those who affirmed it was a doctrine no older than Archbishop Laud Thirdly against those who averr that the Church and her Divines have taught it for their own Interests and Fourthly against those who of late reject that Doctrine upon Popish Principles that Power is originally in the People and that the Foundation of all Government is laid in Compact c. To all which he opposes the authority of the Church and the concurrent judgment of her D●vines from the beginning of the Reformation hoping to perswade the world that so many pious and learned Men could not so unanimously agree in a Error or Preach and Write in so many Reigns meerly to flatter their Princes and gratifie their own Ambition This is the apparent design of that work and I hope it might become a Christian Page 4. and Protestant and member of our Church and to make you believe that it was as piously and charitably intended as you say you would have hoped had it come out before first of August I assure you that it was designed by the Author to come out long before and that the difficulty of getting of it Printed was the cause why it came abroad so late As such a Book cannot be written in a day so you must needs know it cannot be Printed when and where the Author pleases and you did very ill to put that conceit of Exposing c. in peoples heads who had it not been for you Vindication would more generally have concluded from the History not that you were guilty of Apostacy or Perjury Page 4. but that you had taken the New Oath in some Sense or upon some Principles which in your own Consciences you did believe consistent with the doctrine of Non-resistance and your former Oaths This Inference will more naturally occur to the thoughts of those who read the History than the other and if you had well thought of it you might have spared the pains of your Vindication Or if you had thought fit to give the world an account upon what Principle you had taken the Oath you ought to have forborn such unjustifiable reflections as you have made upon that Author in the Plural Number and not have set forth him and I know not how many more as ment that were content to Sacrifice the names of all but an inconsiderable number of their Brethren to their own reputation Page 4. that they may be thought the stanch men and steddy to their Principles I think the writing of the History doth no more tend to the Sacrificing your names to their reputation than the writing of many Books for the taking the Oath doth Sacrifice them to yours Your Books tempt some men to think they stand off out of Pride and sullenness and this it may be makes some think that you have acted contrary to your Principles but these opinions of men which cannot be prevented ought not to make you fall our and treat one another as you do But as to those Principles to which you tauntingly say they would be thought stanch they are Church of England Principles or they are not if you could have proved they were not then you had Written to purpose against the History but if they are then I know not why this inconsiderable number may not have a very good Title to the honourable character of stanch and steddy Men who chuse to suffer rather than take an Oath which after reading all that you have published to perswade Men to take it they yet think repugoant to that doctrine which you would not be thought to have deserted But good Sir why inconsiderable number may not the men be considerable tho' the number is not or are we to judge of the cause by the number or of the number by the cause you forget that your Metropolitan is one of this inconsiderable number you forget the men of parts learning and probity that are in it also nay you forget who was the inconsiderable number in the reigns of Constantius and Valens in the Empire