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cause_n	good_a	know_v	see_v	4,988	5	3.1452	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34208	Concubinage and poligamy disprov'd, or, The divine institution of marriage betwixt one man, and one woman only, asserted in answer to a book, writ by John Butler, B.D. for which he was presented as follows : We the grand jury, sworn to enquire for the body of the city of London, on Wednesday, the first day of December, 1697, present one John Butler, for writing and publishing a wicked pamphlet : wherein he maintains concubinage to be lawful, and which may prove very destructive to divers families, if not timely suppress'd.		1698 (1698)	Wing C5714; ESTC R1558	49,472	113

been over-ruled by the Influence of Father Peters and others who then govern'd at Whitehall what hinder'd Mr. Butler from taking some of his Brethren of the Clergy or other Credible Witnesses with him Finally to exhort his Wife and to declare to her that if she did not return to her Duty he would look upon their Marriage as Dissolv'd and provide for himself accordingly If she had after all this continued Obstinate why might not Mr. Butler have taken his Maid with him and before his Brethren of the Ministry or some Justices of the Peace declar'd that his Wife had deserted him without any Lawful Cause and would not return to her Duty that he had applied to all the Ordinary Courts of Justice but could have no Remedy and therefore being under a Necessity either of burning or taking another Woman into his Bed he was resolv'd to live with his Maid as Man and Wife Had Mr. Butler done so and made it appear to the World that his Wife had no just Cause to desert him there are few Casuists so Rigid as to have condemn'd him either as a Concubinary or Adulterer every Body would have excus'd the want of due Formalities in such a Case and his Practice would have given no just Scandal to others no more than did that of the Marquis of Vicum which we shall have occasion to touch upon by and by Mr. Butler owns that his Marriage with his Wife was not altogether formal and yet he made no Scruple to take her to his Bed and therefore we have no Reason to think that he should have scrupled the doing of this as abovesaid had all things been fair and honest and if he had dreaded the anger of the Government he might have retir'd to Holland as he did afterward But instead of this if we may believe his Wife as quoted by himself p 18. she accuses him of saying That he had another Woman with Child for which she relinquish'd him and offers to prove his having said so These Circumstances are so scandalous that it plainly appears the Matter ought to have been Examined by Judges Competent but it would seem Mr. Butler and his Maid were in too much haste for that or indeed to stay in the Kingdom seeing they went over to Holland where she brought him forth a Daughter as he owns himself I come next to consider Mr. Butler's Arguments for Defence of his Practice 1. He quotes 1 Cor. 7. 15. where the Apostle says But if the unbelieving depart let him depart A brother or a sister is not in bondage in such Cases In this Case therefore says Mr. Butler a man 's own Conscience was a good Judge at least until contrary matters could be proved before ae Competent Judge and the Testimony of Holy Writ was a sufficient Law for Conscience to be guided by and this without the assistance of being backt by Authority in a Case where an Authoritative sentence could not be had as it was in St. Pauls time Wherein the Magistracy being altogether Paganish no such sentence was required as needful and as in the Marquess of Vicums Case wherein the supreme Authority being Popish he married again without such a sentence 'T is true indeed he had a Sentence by Authority from the Syndick of Geneva but that was as much as just nothing for first that Syndick had no Authority to summon his Wife to appear at their Court she being not under their Jurisdiction and secondly being a lay Power set up of their own accord without Power from God or his Word had not so much Power as the Conscience of the Marquess himself To this I Answer 1. That Mr. Butlers Case and that put by the Apostle are not alike the Apostle speaks of an Unbelievers deserting a Believer out of an hatred to Religion but Mr. Butlers Wife was of the same Religion with himself so that he ought to have been backt with the Authority of the Church whereof they were both Members before he had gone into his Maids Bed This is the Opinion of Calvin and Sclaterus upon the place who say Lex Christi de Christianae disciplinae Consortibus agit quos propius Vinculum connectit apud quos si quod aberratum est facilis est sanatio per Ecclesiae Authoritatem i. e. The Law of Christ speaks of those who are partakers of the Christian Discipline and own'd by a nearer Tie and who if they commit any Error the cure is easy by the Authority of the Church but we don't find that Mr. Butler sought any such Remedy but supinely neglected it under a pretence it could not be had 2. Mr. Butlers Case differs also in this That we had Christian Magistrates to whom he might have appeal'd in this Case which it does not appear he did Nor will it follow that because the Apostle says the Believer was at Liberty in Case of the unbelievers deserting that therefore they were at liberty to take another into their Bed without acquainting both the Church and the Magistrate with it It was a General Rule to all Christians to give no Offence neither to Jew nor Gentile nor to the Church of God and therefore it is not supposeable that Christians were referred to the dictates of their own Private Conscience in the Case of Marriage after desertion tho they might rest secure and without any further trouble upon the Testimony of a good Conscience as to the cause of desertion viz. That it was from an hatred to their Religion but Mr. Butler knows that his Wife accuses him of another Cause Viz. The defiling of her Bed Then as to the Marquis of Vicums Case it is also quite different every one that knows the Story of the Famous Galeacius Caracciolus knows that he fled out of Italy upon the Account of his Religion that his Lady would neither follow him nor admit him to her Bed when by the Intercession of his Great Friends he procur'd leave to return for a time her Priests having prevail'd with her to the contrary so that he was forced to return without her and lived several Years unmarried and unblameable at Geneva without getting into any Womans Bed in little more than a Years time and at last by the consent not only of the Church of Geneva but of other Protestant Churches and the approbation of the Supreme Government where he lived he married a Godly Woman not in a private manner but in the View of the World for it 's only the deeds of darkness that are afraid of the Light As to Mr. Butlers falling foul upon the Government of Geneva as having no Power from God and his Word he only discovers that he is as bad a Politician as a Divine and a Casuist of no Value That little Common-wealth had always since any thing was known of the History of those Parts a Supreme Government of her own sometimes by a Count and sometimes under the Protection of the Emperor and when the Empire was

abstain for the sake of a beloved Wife still alive 2. He owns that he had two ungracious Sons the Eldest of whom he disinherited because of his turning Papist this methinks to a Minister of the Gospel should have been a Cause of Fasting and Prayer and Mortifying of the Flesh To be abandoned by a Loving Wife afflicted by two ungracious Sons at the same time and one of them turn'd Idolater and running headlong to Damnation too Any thing of a Christian would have seen the Hand of God in all this humbled themselves before him afflicted their Souls by secret Fasting and Prayer and have desir'd the Prayers of the Church and their particular Christian Friends in such a pungent Affliction If in such a Case the Devil had begun to tempt Mr. Butler for his Incontinency Why did he not bring his Body under Subjection by Fasting Watching and Prayer according to the Practice of the Apostle who thereby got rid of that Thorn in the Flesh mentioned 2 Cor. 1● 7. Which Mr. Butler knows many Commentators and those none of the least Note understand to have been Pruritus Carnis the Tickling of the Flesh as Tremellius renders it from the Syriack But it seems our Author was in this Respect like the Pharisees of Old who would bind heavy burdens upon other Mens backs but would not touch them themselves with one of their Fingers Mr. Butler could not but forsee that this Practice of going in to his Maid which is unpresidented in this Nation would administer cause of Scandal and this it became one of his Character to avoid above all Men If his Maids Beauty tempted him it was in his Power to have rid himself of that Tentation But to be plain with him his Case has all the suspicious Circumstances Imaginable to make the World believe that he was Acted by down-Right Lust in this matter and being once engaged now he would defend it Answerable to the Practise of that Infamous German Enthusiast John of Leyden who being observed to go into his Maids bed did thereupon maintain the Doctrine of Poligamy and the like unclean Practice engaged the false Prophet Mahomet in the Defence of the like unclean Doctrine 3. Mr. Butler owns That his Wife and Sons accuse him of former Incontinency and the Truth on 't is his Practice and Principles both being considered there 's no great Reason to doubt but their Accusation might be true If he owns his Incontinency now when Aged It 's probable he was more so Twenty Years ago If the desertion of a beloved Wife the Rebellion and Apostacy of his Sons the Common danger which all Men at that time thought impending over the Church whereof he was a Minister the Dignity of his Function and the Scandal of the World could not keep him from his Maids Bed Ten Years ago What can be thought sufficient to have restrain'd him from such like Practises Twenty Years ago 4. If there was no such unlawful Dalliance betwixt Mr. Butler and his Maid while his Wife Cohabited with him It 's much that his Maid was so soon brought over to receive another Womans Husband into her Bed and indeed one would think that Mr. Butler at that time should have had so much trouble upon him on the Account of his Wife and Children c. As above that he should have had little Inclination or leasure for a New Courtship if the Familiarity had not been Contracted before So much for the Causes to suspect that Mr. Butler was guilty of Scandalous Incontinence in this matter I come now to consider the pretended Necessity he says he lay under Durum telum Necessitas Necessity is indeed an Irresistible Weapon but many times we make a Necessity to our selves when God makes none and such I am affraid Mr. Butlers Necessity will be found His Necessity proceeded meerly from his Incontinence as he owns himself but we hear nothing either of Spiritual or Temporal means us'd by him to remove this Incontinence Had he fasted watched prayed removed his Maid out of his sight taken the advice of Physicians open'd a Vein frequently Bath'd in cold Water often and been assiduous in the Work of his Calling as a Minister and yet found his Incontinence too hard for him after all there would have been some justifiable Pretence for his Necessity but we find nothing of this done and therefore the Necessity is of his own making If Mr. Butler had found his Pruritus Carnis or Incontinence unconquerable after the use of these or such like Means as above-mentioned had it not been better for him to have reconciled his Wife to him by restoring his Popish Son to the Right of Inheritance which he pretends to be the cause of her deserting him then to take his Maid into his Bed The former he knows no Body would have blam'd as Criminal whereas he could not but know that the latter would be accounted Scandalous Or if this had not been Practicable why did not he sue for a Divorce from his Wife upon those just suspicions of Incontinence he charges her with by turns p. 4. of his Epistle to the Reader c. And likewise upon the Account of her Desertion which he so much insists upon Had he done this in a Legal manner and found all the Doors of ordinary Justice shut against him then he might have had recourse to extraordinary Methods But we don't find that he did any thing like it so that his excuse of Poperies being possess'd of the Supreme Seat and that the High Commissioners superseded all other Courts and Acted in favour of Persons Popishly enclin'd is a meer Subterfuge to cheat his own Conscience and gull the World This I am sure he will find a Dilemma that had he endeavour'd to reconcile his Wife by restoring his Popish Son to his Right of Inheritance he would have herein been favour'd by the Court as he owns himself and that he was willing to have retain'd his Wife if she had been willing to have staid with him he has declar'd it when he says that he sollicited her to his Bed for above a Twelve-month But we don't so much as find that he made any Application to the Ordinary Courts in that Case so that he Arraigns their Justice without having made Tryal of it It 's well enough known to the World that the then Archbishop of Canterbury and several other Bishops did then oppose the Proceedings of the Court in Ecclesiastical Matters such as the publishing of the Proclamation for Liberty of Conscience to Dissenters and turning out the Fellows of Colledges So that Mr. Butler had no Reason to decline Application to the Court of Arches for Remedy in his Case nor is there any Reason to think but the High-Commission Court wherein there were three Bishops of the Church of England might have done him Justice if he had applied to them in a Case so plain as he alledges his to have been But supposing that both those Courts had