a part of our Religion to be subject to the higher Powers not only for wrath but for Conscience-sake and rather to bear the Effects of all those suspitions Jealous heads can entertain of their designs against our Profession than to lift up rebellious Swords against the Gods of the Earth our Lawful Superiors It is generally supposed that Princes and Governors have a severe eye upon all Innovators and that they cannot contentedly endure those who are of a different Religion from themselves but that one time or other they will revenge that affront put upon them by dissenters This supposition is laid hold on by Ill men Enemies to the Church and State for first they study to draw others off under a pretence of some great deficiency from the publick National Profession then they encourage to a perseverance in their separation then perswade them they have by so doing exasperated the Civil Magistrate beyond hopes of reconciliation and last to add Sin to Sin teach them to rise against their Lords and to extort that liberty of Conscience they cry out for from their Superiors by force of Arms and whereas well meaning persons may possibly scruple to lift up their Hands against the Lords Anointed Knox and Buchanan and others of that Leven have given out a relaxing Doctrine That Princes for just causes may be deposed That the People have the same power over the King the highest Governour that the King hath over any one Man That the Commons of any Kingdom may lawfully require of their King to have true Preachers of which the same Commons must be the ultimate Judges and if he be negligent then they the Commons themselves may justly provide them maintain them defend them against all that persecute them and may detain the profits of Church-Livings from those Preachers whom they approve not of all Laws Ordinances Statutes to the contrary notwithstanding And now where these or the like Doctrines obtain credit where so much power is put into the hands of the People what Church can be at Vnity long within it self what Laws of any effect or Validity what Governors can be secure from the violence of the giddy-headed changeable and easily deluded Populace Had the Apostles and other the first Preachers of the Gospel advanced such odious Doctrines as these they would soon have brought the World about their Ears and Pliny would have found something else to have informed the Emperor Trajan about than their Honest mutual Engagements their early Prayers and inordinate Superstition nor would Providence have been concerned in defence of an armed Gospel such discoveries were reserved to the news lights of our times who else would have had nothing to have recommended themselves to the World by One main reason of St. Paul's speaking so much against divisions and breaches in the Church of Christ was that by unity and peace among themselves Christians might become the less obnoxious to the State For since it pleased God sometimes even under Heathen Kings and Emperors to give the Churches peace on every side and the uninterrupted protection of the Laws he would not have them by Schisms among themselves drive one another to a necessity of trespassing upon those Laws they were Protected by nor to exasperate the higher Powers so far as to reduce themselves to the sad choice of Perfecution or Rebellion He had given them a better example by his own Carriage toward the Jews when he could truly plead for himself against them that neither against the Law of the Jews nor against the Temple nor against Cesar had he offended any thing at all and happy had we in this Nation been had those great pretenders to Holiness and Reformation who caus'd all our woes and miseries some years since follow'd this great Apostle's pattern but the Act of Parliament for the observation of this Day informs us of the impossibility of such a thing It tells us They were a party of wretched Men desperately wicked and hardned in their impiety who having first plotted and contrived the ruine of this Excellent Monarchy and with it of the true Reformed Religion which had been long protected by it and flourished under it found it necessary in order to the Carrying on their traiterous and pernicious Designs to throw down all the bulwarks and fences of Law and to subvert the very Being and Constitution of Parliament that so they might at last make their way open for any farther Attempts upon the sacred Person of his Majesty himself they then began at the destruction of the Church proceeded to subversion of the Laws ended in an Horrid Rebellion and the Barbarous murder of their Sovereign Many perhaps in those black days had no prospect of those damnable Consequences learn from thence then the folly of those who dare engage themselves in separating and Schismatical Courses how God in them punishes one sin by another commonly till their damnation is irremediable but who could have suspected such Cruel Wolves under their Sheeps cloathing who could have believed such plausible pretences had veil'd such devilish Treachery and Hypocrisie or indeed who could but suspect them if their first motions were but rationally ballanced This Nation nor any of its Neighbours were ever blest with a Prince of more Prudence Goodness or Exemplary Piety than Charles the first of glorious Memory No Church since the time of our Saviour and his Apostles themselves was ever reformed to a higher or more Apostolical Purity in Doctrine or Discipline No greater or more faithful Lights shone in the whole Christian world at that time than the Fathers of our Church the Priests attending at God's sacred Altar Our National felicity our plenty riches prosperity were the Envy and Wonder of all the Nations round about us Now when men begin to cry out for Reformation in such a juncture of Affairs as this it looks like earnest seeking for a reason of Quarrelling it argues a Capricious and discontented Humour to complain without cause and a foul Stomach to nauseate the descending Manna the food of blessed Angels When the Malicious Heads of the Age had Caball'd together to render the Government as obnoxious as possible when they had made all the bitter reflexions imaginable upon the Prelates of the Church the Counsellors of the State and the King himself their Head when they had search'd the very Cabinet of their Prince and expos'd his most reserv'd Secrets to the View of the World even then all their Charges were prov'd by the clearest reasons to be nothing but Slanders Calumnies Lyes and the most gross absurdities that united Hell could ever invent How often then were the traiterous Swords of his sworn Subjects lifted up against the sacred life of their gracious Sovereign and yet at that very time In what charming terms did that Gentle Prince woe his stubborn and obdurate Rebels but seriously to weigh and examine the truth of things before it was too late in how pathetic terms did he set
of those Rules they walk by and of the desperate and damnable Errors which those who agree not with them in all things run themselves into they conclude the utter Extirpation of all such to be the doing the work of the Lord heartily they think no means too violent to propagate their Opinions nor that any kind of Cruelty which compells men whether they will or not to go to Heaven If such imagin the Established Church to be that Babylon so much condemn'd in Scripture 't will not be enough for them the People of God to come out of her but the Daughter of Babylon being destined to destruction Happy shall he be that takes and dashes her little ones against the stones according to the Psalmists expression Ps 137.8 9. Nay what can it be accounted but the most compleat Charity for me when I am sure I am in the way to Happiness my self to do the utmost to bring all others into the same Blissful Condition About 600 Years after the building of Rome some tell us that the Institutes of Numa Pompilius the second King of Rome were found which being inspected by the Quindecemviri appointed for such purposes and found to contain a far different Scheme of Religion from what was then used among the Romans the Senate ordered them to be burnt Lactan l. 1. c. 22. so fearful were that People of Creating general disorders by permitting Innovations in the Sacred Rites But that Religion they so carefully defended being false and Idolatrous How much more reason have Christian Princes and Governors to secure theirs which is founded upon the Infallible word of God from the encroaching Impertinencies of froward Schismaticks that Law which forbids Conventicles of Separatists is grounded upon that reason that in those Meetings Seditions and Treasons had frequently been and at any time might be contriv'd the reason is good and true and in Venner's Case was prov'd and where Men can have the confidence to break the Statute by meeting in unlawful Assemblies 't is mere Cavilling to question whether they could not with as good a Conscience make Good the reason of it Some from Scotland in the Days of Queen Elizabeth endeavour'd to commend the new-fangled Reformation as no Enemy to Government and yet even in that very discourse Pen'd for the purpose They charge the Judges and Lawyers a Company of Godless Men as they call them with having made it a Common and long practice to make of the Statutes ordain'd for the maintenance of Religion and Common quietness a Pit wherein to catch the peaceable of the Lord See Bancroft ' s English Scottizing p. 54. and this when they acted justly according to Law and the true meaning of it by which words they plainly express their hatred to the common Laws which yet they own at the same time to be the bonds of peace and quietness But Authority sleeps not all this while the Sword is often and justly drawn to quell these dividing and seditious Spirits Kings cannot see Religion ruin'd and their Laws trampled upon without a deep resentment which the most factious persons are very sensible of but that Consideration is so far from quieting their turbulent Humours that it rather drives them on to more desperate and impious actions If they may not separate from the Church without disturbance nor break the Laws of the Nation without punishment the next Blow shall be at the Lawgivers Head the very foundations of the Government shall be overturn'd and that by the 3d. Thing St. Paul clears himself in the Text from viz. by treachery and Rebellion by flying in the face of Cesar himself the best security a Dilinquent in the former respects pretends to It was doubtless a very happy time in the opinion of such among the Israelites when there was no King in Israel but every man did that which was right in his own eyes Judg. 21.25 and yet some and upon very good grounds have imagined that that very circumstance the want of a King or Supreme Governour was the cause of such deeds as never had been seen from the day that the Children of Israel came up out of Egypt to that time Judg. 19.30 and had almost procured the utter excision of one of their Tribes ch 21.3 But this is not always a security sufficient for a Malefactor Cain when he had murdered his Brother fear'd no Superiors animadverting upon him and yet that guilt which lay upon his mind told him that every one that found him should slay him and when the Jews by slighting their own Religion and by breaking God's Laws had provok'd him to bring the Chaldean army to scourge them they hoping that the Egyptian power would secure them the Chaldeans having already rais'd their siege that was laid against Jerusalem the Prophet Jeremiah assures them That though they had smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans so that there should remain none but wounded men among them even those wounded men should rise up every one in his Tent and burn Jerusalem with fire Jer. 37.10 from both which instances it appears that even where there are no higher powers to call Men to an Account for Crimes their very equals or it may be their Inferiors will be their punishers But though this be indeed true yet the way of opposing the higher powers in a covert or open manner by Treachery or Rebellion is the best help guilty persons can find out By so doing they stand upon their guard and challenge Justice if it dare to attacque them But that is not enough such men as have outlaw'd themselves by their disobedience are too distrustful to keep themselves only in a defensive posture a single person seldom is a Rebel if there be Confederates there must be some rule of maintaining that Confederacy and those who have transgressed just and justly imposed Laws may as readily upon a fair opportunity offer'd break those unjust articles by which Conspiracies are holden together So Sheba the Son of Bichri the Ring-Leader of the Rebellion against David had his Head thrown over the Walls of Abel by his own party when that Sacrifice might divert a storm from their Heads Therefore such persons are generally the Aggressors in a Civil War hoping by activity and a full employment to engage all their Party so far in the displeasure of their Superiors that mere dispair of Pardon shall make them saithful and resolute in their perfidious undertakings To this purpose it was subtilly enough advis'd by Achitophel in the Rebellion of Absalom That Absalom should go in to his Fathers Concubines one of the foulest actions he could possibly be guilty of the reason of which he gives all Israel shall hear that thou art abhor'd of thy Father then shall the hands of all that are with thee be strong 2 Sam. 16.21 for when the People had once seen Absalom's resolution by that unpardonable Villany and made themselves his Accomplices by being Spectators and Approvers of it it was not
before them the dangers they expos'd themselves to both in this and the future World by setting themselves against the ordinance of God! How did his tender Soul relent for those unhappy Wretches whose zealous Ignorance hurried them to death in so cursed a Cause but alas the hardest Rocks the very Walls that held him a Prisoner to his Rebels were not more insensible than those remorseless Villains who by Treasons had got the greater power and were resolv'd to abuse it to his destruction for whose sacred life millions of such Hellish Souls had been but too mean a Sacrifice Our Saviour once told Pilate that If his Kingdom had been of this world then his servants would have fought that he should not have been delivered to the Jews John 18.36 The Case was alter'd now our Saint-like Rebels thought the Kingdom of Charles the First not to be of this World else would they never have been so unnatural to have fought against to have condemn'd to have murdered him Jews indeed they were in wickedness and labour'd hard to copy out Jewish treachery and cruelty to their Messiah the ever blessed Jesus in their false and bloody Dealing with his Vicegerent the Anointed of the Lord. It was an ill sight in the judgment of Solomon to see Servants on Horse-back and Princes like Servants walking upon the Earth Eccl. 10.7 but how much more dismal was the sight to see a great Monarch led by a company of bruitish Guards as his Saviour had been before as a Sheep to the slaughter to see awful Majesly appear by compulsion before those persons his pretended Judges whose Fathers he would have disdain'd to have set with the Dogs of his flock Who were children of fools yea children of base men who were viler than the earth as Job 30.1.8 expresses it there to hear himself vilified and belyed by the impudence of a Mercenary Wretch to hear the sentence of Death pronounced upon him by those who ow'd their own lives to the protection of his Laws even then when they broke them desperately to his ruine But what Adamantine Heart but would bleed to see that Sacred Head struck off by an execrable Villain and shew'd to the Astonished Multitude under the scandalous Name of the Head of a Traitor Such as this surely was a throughly reforming Practice well becoming those Blood-thirsty Saints whose Devilish atchievements we this day sadly Commemorate Thus Jesuitism and Separation go hand in hand both hold Princes responsible to their Subjects as Superiors both hold them liable as well as others to Excommunication both hold the Subjects absolv'd from their sworn Allegeance to that Prince whom they judge an Enemy to God both hold it lawful to oppose him by force of Arms and both conclude in Murder and I make no question but the same Heaven which receiv'd St. Garnet St. Fawx St. Clement St. Ravilliac and their Followers may equally contain St. Cromwell Bradshaw Corbet Peters and the rest of that Hellish fraternity who all dyed impenitent in the same damnable faith if their own Friends bely them not But the Sun is risen again God has visited us in Mercy beyond our deserts and we see the Gracious Son of Charles the Martyr seated on the throne of his Father May his Reign be prosperous and his Days many ready has this incorrigible Nation been to run headlong again into its former woes Antimonarchical Doctrines walk abroad again in open day Suspicions and Jealousies are reentertain'd the busie Separatists active to buoy up their Party and to make an Interest once more great enough to reverse those Laws which justly take notice of them as Hypocritical and Seditious rather than true Protestants The old Steps had been so far traced again that had not Almighty God inspired his Vicegerent among us with wisdom from above to crush those Basilisks in their early motions the Kingdom in all probability had e're this been made an Acel-dama a field of Blood But thanks be to God at last the Snare is broken and we in some measure delivered God of his mercy direct our Sovereign still and confound the subtle and incessant Devices of his Enemies God grant that we may know in this our day the things that belong to our Peace that we may sincerely pray for and obey our Prince that we may contend earnestly for that Faith which was once delivered to the Saints that laying aside all Malice and Hypocrisie we may serve the Lord our Defender and the Restorer of our breaches with fear and rejoice before him with reverence that his blessing may ever rest upon us and upon our King for Jesus Christ's sake To whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit c. FINIS