Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	great_a	lord_n	people_n	4,203	5	4.5705	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85281	The fifth monarchy, or Kingdom of Christ, in opposition to the beasts, asserted, by the Solemn League and Covenant, several learned divines, the late General and Army, (viz.) in their declaration at Muslebrough, August 1650. wherein the old cause is stated, appeals made, the Scottish blood spilt, and the banners yet in Westminster-Hall witnessing the great decision then given on Christs side. Also, by a letter from the officers of the Army in England, to their brethren in Ireland, the 11 of May, 1653. justifying on Christs accompt, the dissolution of the Parliament; and consonant thereunto, the Generals speech to those that succeeded in the government, the fourth of July following ...		1659 (1659)	Wing F890; Thomason E993_31; ESTC R207791	44,997	55

the Kingdom and Interest of Jesus Christ and Supporters of the Throne of the Beast been with all their Adherents by Sea and Land engaged with vanquisht and subdued broken like Potters vessels and the righteous judgments of God executed upon many of the heads of them as Traytors and Rebels Was King and Kingship as standing in opposition to the Kingdom of Christ being as was said one of the ten horns of the Beast Rev. 17. taken away Was the Parliamentary Authority defaced garbled purged and at last utterly broke as Obstructers hereof and that by the Army at their desire and to the great joy of most of the godly in the Land as having lost the Spirit of the Cause and so far degenerated into a selfish and persecuting Spirit that there appeared an enmity thereto And lastly was there another people called eminently by the Lord to own assert and carry on this cause and interest of Christs Kingly Authority to whom all due subjection was promised for Christs sake as to an Authority God had set over them to such an end 1 Quest Whether it will not necessarily follow that either the Parliament Army Ministers and others that have thus stated asserted engaged in such a cause as Gods and Christs and founding it upon the Word of God to the shaking and breaking all visible Rule and Government which for so many hundred years hath in Church and State been over us in these Nations have either been grosly deluded and so become guilty of all the blood that hath been spilt in this quarrel and consequently a company of Munster-spirited Tyrants Traytors and Murderers as it hath been reflected upon them and so ought to repent in dust and ashes and to endeavour all due satisfaction possible to Cavaleers Scots Prelates and Presbyters or if stated upon sound principles of Truth and Righteousness which the Lord hath eminently owned and led to step by step and that all this shaking overturning that hath been made in Church and State in order to the pulling down of Babylon and exalting the Kingdom of his Son is warranted and justified by the holy Scripture then doubtless ought this Cause to be owned adhered unto and prest after with all zeal and fidelity and they are to be esteemed Apostates Revolters and Backsliders that shall decline or turn aside herefrom 2 Quest Whether the Army who in so much seeming light and love to God bringing this glorious cause into the hands of his people having broken down the National constitution with a declared subjection to them for Christs sake are not guilty of most dreadful Apostacy and Rebellion against him his Crown and Dignity First in breaking that Assembly so by the Lord in that eminent manner called together whilst in the faithful prosecution of the said cause Secondly in setting up their Apostate General and afterwards his Son even in contradiction to all the Lords wondersul works amongst us as heads of Church and State and to whom were made all those blasphemous dreadsul Addresses Oaths and Engagements to the licking up their vomit again owning and establishing all the Pride Tyranny and Idolatry under new names and pretences that had been so contemptuously cast down amongst us viz. Kingship Peerage and Prelacy under the terms of Protector an Other House and Tryers who being set up and an assay made to confirm all by Parliament their Counsel being confounded so that they could not bring about their Enterprises as a further fruit of backsliding the Army have sought out another invention to withstand the true heir the Lord Jesus and kept him from his right by calling together such as formerly were by them dissolved for want of spirit and being in opposition to the Lords work and that it was so in truth have not very many of them given sufficient evidence by being Principals in the late Apostacy and the generality such as stuck not to lift up their hands to the most High that they would be true and faithful to the now deposed Usurper And those few of renown amongst them whose integrity was tryed it 's to be feared in the conclusion may serve for little more then to give countenance to what further their deceived hearts are lusting after of which some proof is already given in their votes for continuing the oppression in paying Tythes keeping from sale Hampton Court and White hall but more especially their Act of Indempnity sufficiently justifying the wicked and consequently condemning the righteous 3 Quest Whether they who have owned the Lord in all his dispensations in the midst of all these oppositions and declension of others ought not to be esteemed the well-affected to the Cause of God his people and this Nation rather then slanderously reported Munster-spirited and fanatick Obj. What would these people have The Cavaleeres old and new with the Commonwealths-men have somewhat to offer but these neither know what they say or whereof they affirm Answ Were it granted they were so weak as not to be able to hold forth some well-composed Model of Government being still it may be better at pulling down as is said page 24. line 10. then building up and establishing works is this a good Argument to slight any rational dissatisfaction to what is now set up If Episcopacy had never been taken away until some well ordered Church Government had been offered to succeed it by the Puritans who were then esteemed as ignoraut giddy and fanatique because they did not would it not have remained to this day But for further satisfaction there are four things in the Assirmative wherein there seems to be a general agreement amongst this people tending much to settlement upon a righteous Foundation 1. In reference to their Soveraign That the Lord Jesus Christ in whose Name and by whose blessing and strength the mighty works have been effected amongst us against Tyranny in the Civil and Antichristianism in the Ecclesiastick State may be publickly owned Our only Lord and King from whom as the head all Power Rule and Authority in Church and State is to be derived in opposition to every other Title without which alteration since the Foundations are out of course it will be utterly impossible there should be any subsistence for that the Image-Government or fourth Beasts constitution must as certainly be overturned and broken to give way to this Fifth Kingdom as the other were broken to give way to the fourth Dan. 2. 1 Tim. 6.15 He is the blessed and onely Potentate King of kings and Lord of lords John 5.27 And hath given him Authority to execute judgment also because he is the Son of man Isaiah 9.6 The Government shall be upon his shoulders Obj. How can Christ be said to be our King is he not in heaven Answ God was Israels King of old though heaven was his habitation 1 Chron. 29.23 Solomon sate on the Throne of the Lord 1 Chron. 29.23 2 Chron. 9.8 When Israel would imitate other Nations in making them a King they

mercies that God had shewed the expectations that were in the hearts of all good men would have prompted those that were in Authority to have done those good things which might by honest men have been judged a return fit for such a God and worthy of such mercies and indeed a discharge of duty to those for whom all these mercies have been shewed that is the Interest of the three Nations the true interest of the three Nations And if I should now labour to be particular in enumerating some businesses that have been transacted from that time till the dissolution of the late Parliament indeed I should be upon a Theme would be very troublesome to my self The necessity and duty on the Army for dissolving the long Parliament For I must say for my self and Fellow-Officers we have rather desired and studied healing then to rake into sores and look backward to render things in those colours that would not be very well pleasing to any good eye to look upon Onely this we must say for our own exoneration and as thereby laying some foundation for the making evident the necessity and duty that was incumbent upon us to make this last great Change I think it will not be amiss to offer a word or two in that not taking pleasure to rake into the business were not there some kind of necessity so to do Which they sought to heal and prevent Indeed we may say without commending our selves I mean my self and those Gentlemen that have been engaged in the Military affairs that upon our return we came fully bent in our hearts and thoughts to desire and use all fair and lawful means we could to have had the Nation to reap the fruit of all that blood and treasure that had been expended in this cause and we have had many desires and thirstings in our spirits to finde out ways and means wherein we might any ways be instrumental to help it forward 1. By Petition of August 1652. and we were very tender for a long time so much as to Petition till August last or thereabouts we never offered to Petition But some of our then Members and others having good acquaintance and relation to divers members of the Parliament we did from time to time sollicite that which we thought if there had been no body to prompt them no body to call upon them would have been listned to out of ingenuity and integrity in them that had opportunity to have answered our expectations And truly when we saw nothing would be done we did as we thought according to our duty remind them by a Petition which Petition I suppose the most of you have seen which we delivered either in July or August last what effect that had is likewise very well known the truth is we had no return at all all the satisfaction for us was but a few words given us the businesses petitioned for most of them we were told were under consideration and those that were not had very little or no consideration at all Finding the people dissatisfied in every corner of the Nation and bringing home to our doors the non-performance of those things that had been promised and were of due to be performed we did think our selves concerned we endeavoured as became honest men to keep up the reputation of honest men in the world 2. By a meeting with some of the Parliament 10 or 12 times beseeching them to discharge their duty and trust to God and Man freely But all in vain and therefore we had divers times endeavoured to obtain a meeting with divers Members of Parliament and truly we did not begin this till October last and in those meetings did in all faithfulness and sincerity beseech them that they would be mindful of their duty to God and man and of the discharge of their trust to God and man I believe these Gentlemen that are many of them here can tell that we had at the least ten or twelve meetings most humbly begging and beseeching them that of their own accords they would do those good things that had been promised that so it might appear they did not do them by any suggestion from the Army but of their own ingenuity so tender were we to preserve them in the reputation and opinion of the people to the uttermost And having had many of those meetings and declaring plainly that the issue would be the judgment and displeasure of God against them the dissatisfaction of the People and the putting things into a confusion Yet how little we did prevaile we well know and we believe is not unknown to you 3. By close considering what other way to have recourse unto At the last when we saw indeed that things would not be laid to heart we had a serious consideration amongst our selves what other way to have recourse unto and when indeed we came to those close considerations they began to take the Act of the NEW REPRESENTATIVE to heart and seemed exceeding willing to put it on the which had it been done or would it have been done with that integrity with that caution that would have saved this Cause and the Interest we have been so long engaged in there could nothing have happened to our judgments more welcome then that would have been Necessity of their dissolution 1. From their endeavours to perpetuate themselves But finding plainly that the intendment of it was not to give the people that Right of choyce although it had been but a seeming right either the seeming to give the people that choyce intended and designed to recrute the House the better to PERPETUATE THEMSELVES And truly having divers of us been spoken to to that end that we should give way to it a thing to which we had a perpetual aversation which we did abominate the thoughts of we always declared our judgements against it and our dissatisfaction but yet they would not hear of a New REPRESENTATIVE before it lay three years before them without proceeding with one line considerably in it They that could not endure to hear of it then when we came to our close considerations then instead of protracting they did make as much preposterous hast of the other hand and ran into that extremity and finding that this spirit was not according to God and that the whole weight of this cause which must needs have been very dear unto us who have so often adventured our lives for it and we believe is so to you when we saw plainly that there was not so much consideration how to assert it or to provide security for it and indeed to cross these that they reckoned the most troublesome people they had to deal with which was the Army which by this time was sufficiently their displeasure when we saw this that had power in our hands truly to let the business go to such an issue as this was to throw back the cause into the hands of them

we first fought with we came to this first conclusion amongst our selves that if we had been fought out of it necessity would have taught us patience 2. That the Army might not be found Traytors to God Man but to be taken from us so unworthily we should be rendered the worst people in the world and we should become TRAYTORS BOTH TO GOD AND MAN And when God had laid this to our hearts and that we found the interest of his people was grown cheap and not laid to heart and if we came to competition of things the cause even among themselves would even almost in every thing go to the ground this did add more consideration to us that there was a duty incumbent upon us And truly I speak it in the presence of some that are here that were at the close consultations I may say as before the Lord the thinking of an act of violence was to us worse than any Engagement that ever we were in yet and worse to us than the utmost hazard of our lives that could be so unwilling were we so tender were we so desirous were we if it were possible that these men might have quit their places with honour And truly this I am the longer upon because it hath been in our hearts and consciences our Justification and hath never yet been imparted thorow to the Nation and we had rather begin with you to do it then to have done it before and do think indeed that these transactions be more proper for a verbal communication then to have put it into writing I doubt whosoever had put it in writing would have been tempted to have dipt his pen in anger and wrath But affairs being at this posture that we saw plainly and evidently in some Critical things 3. The cause of the people despised by them that the Cause of the people of God was a despised thing truly then we did believe that the hands of other men must be the hands that must be trusted with it and then we thought high time for us to look about us and to be sensible of our duty If I should take up your time to tell you what instances we have to satisfie our Judgments and Consciences that these were not vain imaginations and things that were petitioned for but that fell within the compass of our certain knowledge and sence should I repeat these things to you I should do that which I would avoid to take into these things too much 4. A corrupt self-seeking Spirit in them onely this if any body were in competition for any place of real and signal Trust how hard and difficult a thing it were to get any thing to be carried without making parties without things indeed unworthy of a Parliament And when things must be carried so in a Supreme Authority indeed I think it is not as it ought to be But when it came to other Trials in that Case of Wales which I must confess for my own part I set my self upon if I should inform what discountenance that business of the poor people of God there had 5. Discountenance upon the people of God in Wales who had watching over them men like so many wolves ready to catch the Lamb assoon as it was brought out into the world how signally they threw that business under foot to the discountenancing of the honest people there and to the countenancing of the malignant party of this Commonwealth I need but say it was so many have felt by sad experience it was so who will better impart that business to you which for my self and fellow-Officers I think it was as perfect a trial of their spirits as any thing it being known to many of us that God kindles a seed there indeed hardly to be parallell'd since the Primitive times I would this had been all the instances Good to Gods people under the several forms never intended but finding which way their spirits went and finding that good was never intended to the people of God I mean when I say so that large comprehension of them under the several forms of godliness in this Nation when I saw that tenderness was forgotten to them all though it was very true that by their hands and means through the blessing of God they sate were they did and affairs not to speak it boastingly had been instrumentally brought to that issue they were brought to by the hands of those poor creatures we thought this an evil requital I will not say they were at the uttermost pitch of Reformation although I could say that one thing the REGULATION of the LAW so much groaned under in that posture it now is in there was many words spoken for it we know many moneths together was not time enough to pass over one word called Incumbrances I say finding that this was the spirit and complexion of them that though these were faults for which no man should have dared to lift his hand simply for their faults and failings Neglect of reforming the Laws when yet we saw their intendment was to perpetuate themselves and men of this spirit for some had it from their own mouths from their own designes who could not endure to hear of being dissolved this was an high breach of Trust if they had been a Parliament never violated fitting as free and as clear as ever any sat in ENGLAND yet if they would go about to perpetuate themselves we did think this to be so high a breach of trust as greater could not be And we did not go by guess in this and to be out of doubt in it we did having that conference among our selves whereof we gave accompt we did desire once more the night before the difsolution and it had been in our desires some two or three days before that we might speak with some of the principal persons of the house that we might with ingenuity open our hearts to them to the end we might be either convinced of the ground of their principles and intentions to the good of the Nation or if we could not be convinced they would hear our offer or expedient to prevent this mischief and indeed we could not prevail for two or three days till the night before the dissolution there is a touch of this in that our DECLARATION we had often desired it at that time we attained there were above Twenty of them who were members not of the least consideration for interest and ability with whom we desired to discourse those things and had discourse with them and it pleased the Gentlemen Officers of the Army to desire me to offer their sence to them and indeed it was shortly carryed thus we told them that the Reason of our desire to wait upon them was that we might know from them what security lay in the way of their proceedings so hastily with their Representative wherein they had made a few qualifications such as they were and