the most clamorous of the Herd are not able to give the least tolerable Account of their Zeal and Displeasure but run away with any pitiful and unintelligible Pretences and resolve to make good the Cause at all adventure by heat and noise and passion How do they dread the Superstition of a Symbolical Ceremony though they as little understand the true signification of that word as they do the Orthodox Notion of a Procatarctick Cause And therefore 't is not this hard word that scares them from the Churches Communion but 't is their own conceited and pragmatical Humour that affects and triumphs in Contradiction They think it a gallant thing to make a Noise in the World and to correct the Wisdom and Discretion of Publick Authority and that is a fine thing indeed This extravagant Pride is strangely agreeable to the Original Itch and Vanity of Humane Nature and is more natural to Mankind then the Follies of Lust and Wantonness and there is no Inclination that is so difficult either to govern or to vanquish as this petulancy of spirit And men had need to be very watchful and very serious to get the mastery of so fierce and impetuous an Instinct And therefore if we consider how insensible the People are of the Enticements of this Spiritual Lewdness and how unconcern'd to resist the Importunity of its desires or to subdue the force and vigour of its Inclinations 't is no wonder if so vehement a Passion gain without their own express Allowance so entire and absolute a Power over all their Thoughts and Actions So easie you see it is for well-meaning Men to mistake Humour for Conscience though not out of deliberate Malice yet through Ignorance and Inadvertency And therefore think not Sir that 't is the scope of my Design to scoff at their Faults and upbraid their Follies 't is nothing but a Cordial Love to Vertue and Themselves that put me upon these free open and ingenuous Reprehensions For could we but affect the Minds of Men with a serious sense of their Spiritual Wickednesses and prevail with them to make use of all the ordinary methods of Reason and Christian Prudence for the Mortification of their Original Pride and Sullenness and could we but reduce them to the softness and gentleness of a Christian Temper how ashamed would they be of this brawling and contentious Humour And they would then scarce think it decent to be bold and malapert to their Superiours for any cause of Religion nor would they think it worth the while to sacrifice the indispensable Duties of the Gospel for every scruple and weak Proposition nor disturb the Publick Peace nor affront the Publick Laws for Impertinencies and trifling Opinions They would then live quietly in their own Families and Neighbourhoods and pursue the Interest and Employment of their Callings instead of carrying Tales and sowing Dissentions And the precious time they now wast in quarrelling for Opinions and in arguings and disputings for Trifles and impotent Fancies they would then improve in Offices of Love and Charity among their Neighbours in relieving the Necessitous in reconciling Differences in stifling Slanders and in clearing injured Reputations To conclude so far would Tenderness of Conscience be from pleading Scruple and Nicety in Opposition to the Commands of Publick Authority that it would not be more tender and curious of any Duty then Obedience and Humility The serious sense of its own Weakness its Reverence to the Persons and Authority of Superiours its love of Modesty Meekness Humility Peace and Ingenuity would easily prevail with it to offer up all its private Conceits and uncertain Opinions to so many Advantages of Peace and so many Vertues of Obedience § 10. II. They are not content to run down the Author with Lyes and Calumnies but to make sure work they will slander his Reasonings and raise false witness against his Arguments They will alter and pervert his smartest and most convictive Proofs till they have made them as weak and trifling as their own Pretences With whatsoever plainness and perspicuity he express his Thoughts 't is all one for that they are a People of an undaunted and shameless Brow they will look Truth and Reason out of Countenance they will insult over his Modesty will triumph in their own Insolence and silence all the Reason in the World with Affronts and rude Behaviour They are resolved to joyn Throats to Vote him down and if they do to what purpose is it to Complain or Remonstrate all he shall gain by it is to be laugh't at for the vanity of his Attempt They blush not to commit a publick Rape upon the Understandings of Mankind and will impose upon us with that boisterous Rudeness as if they conspired to force all the World out of their common senses No Author must challenge the liberty of being his own Interpreter the Power of Expounding Assertions is the Priviledge of the Subject and the Prerogative of the Multitude and if they please they can enforce any Writer to accept a sense that contradicts his words And if they do there is neither Remedy nor Appeal their Judgement is final and arbitrary and what they will have they will have No Caution is sufficient to prevent their Clamours their Leaders can easily descry a foul Design under the fairest Disguise and 't is but setting themselves to contrive some dull and malicious Mistakes and obtruding them upon their blind and sturdy Proselytes and then they are confident and impatient against his whole Discourse and the poor Man without any more ado is knockt down with grievous and dead-doing Objections If Mas Iohn do but whisper some ugly and ill-contrived suggestion away 't is carried with Clamour and Tragical Declamation the Noise propagates like Thunder and spreads like Lightning and the whole City is filled with Tumult and Uproar And now after all this 't is no less impossible to perswade them not to rail at my Book then it is to read it No! 't is prophane 't is stuft with wicked and ungodly Opinions it strikes at the whole Power of Godliness and the very Foundations of Religion and then let me affirm and deny say and prove what I can the People must and will persist in their Anger and their Clamour they will refuse to be satisfied affront their own Consciences and turn Recusants to their own Convictions onely that they may not want pretences and opportunities to rail at me Now what shall a Man do in this case You will say there is no Remedy but Patience that is the onely Antidote against the Venome of malicious Tongues and let your own Innocence be your Defence and Apology But alas this Morality is too high a Cordial for my present exigence my Spirits are not so fainting as to stand in need of Philosophy to relieve and support them I am too proud you know to be affected with all the assaults of Noise and Clamour nothing but Reason can ever move or
Superstition What mean those Flatteries and Congratulations wherewith they besprinkle their Followers as if they were the onely People that are acquainted with the Mysteries and Spiritualities of the Gospel What means their Confinement of the Preaching of the Covenant of Grace to their own Doctrines and their own Congregations What means their boasting of themselves as the onely powerful Soul-searching experimental and spiritual Preachers In brief what means their bestowing nothing but fair Words upon themselves and nothing but foul Language upon us Sure he cannot forget the Words of their own Party and who they were that were The Godly Professors Sion God's Jacobs the Israel of God God's Inheritance when we were Aegypt and Babylon Enemies of the Power of Godliness scoffing Edomites Men of the World Antichristian Apostates Idolaters and Followers of the Whore He certainly must needs be a very young Professor that is unacquainted with this Language But however what is all this to our Author He you may take his word is none of them But what is that to me Did I ever accuse him My design was to describe the Genius of the Party and not the Humour of every individual Professor But 't is the mis-fortune of indiscreet People to betray themselves by their own unnecessary Apologies and to cry Not guilty before they are indicted when their own Consciences Arraign and Convict them For our Author I perceive by sundry Passages and Notions in his Book is a Brother of the Independent Communion and therefore let him seeing he has put himself upon it produce me but one Writer of that Fraternity that is not notoriously guilty of this piece of Pride and Partiality I confess I am not very conversant in their Writings yet I have by chance read one of whom I am confident he has no very small Opinion that exceeds all the Scriblers I ever had the fortune to meet with or the leisure to peruse in these foul and malapert Censures and that is I. O. one of the great Patriarchs of the Congregational Churches All whose Pamphlets are little better then so many Libels against the Church of England and had we been down-right Miscreants or the most wretched Apâ—states in the World he could scarce have given us more unfriendly Language 'T is hard to dip into a Page of his Writings that is not embellish't with some or other of these decent and beautiful Expressions It was the peculiar way of his Sermons and Discourses to magnifie the Parliament-Reformation for a wonderful and providential Recovery of the departed Gospel to these Nations and to represent the design of that Holy War as begun and carried on by the Power and Procurement of the Lord Christ in order to the final Overthrow of the Episcopal Antichrist and the Restauration and Establishment of his own Kingdom He has publish't many excellent Sermons to this purpose such is that entituled A Vision of unchangeable Free Mercy in sending the Means of Grace to undeserving Sinners wherein Gods uncontroulable eternal Purpose in sending and continuing the Gospel by which they all along intend nothing else but their sweaty way of Preaching unto this Nation in the midst of Oppositions and Contingencies is discovered c. preached before the Honourable House of Commons April 29. 1646. Where beside the apparent scope of the Sermon it self he reckons up three Departures of the Gospel from England That by the Saxon Conquest that by the Roman Harlot and that in our days by an almost universal treacherous Apostacy from the Purity of Worship from which the Free Grace and good Pleasure of God has made a great Progress again towards a Recovery So that the Episcopal way of Worship is a perfect Apostacy from the Purity of the Gospel and had it been universal it had been total And again such is his Sermon Of the Branch of the Lord or the Beauty of Sion preached at Edinburgh 1650. where compiling a Catalogue of the Enemies of the House of God in all Ages he reckons up Pharaoh Nebuchadnezzar Dioclesian Iulian and the late Prelates whose Rochets he adds were for that Reason together with other Garments of their Adherents and the Imperial Robes of the forementioned Emperours roll'd up in Blood by the Divine Vengeance and hung up in Gods House as the Spoils of Gods Enemies And 't is no doubt no unpleasant reflection to his People to consider how willing and prodigal their gracious Father is to sacrifice Crowns and Mitres Kingdoms and Churches to the Interest and Plunder of his secret ones For so our Author stiles them I suppose because no body knows or suspects them to be Gods People beside themselves And in his Dedication to the Supreme Authority of the Nation the Commons Assembled in Parliament prefixed to his Sermon preached Octob. 24. 1651. being a Solemn Day of Thanksgiving for the Destruction of the Scots Army at Worcester with sundry other Mercies he tells his Patrons That as whatever there has been of Beauty Glory or Advantage unto the People of God in the late Transactions at Worcester hath been eminently of undeserved Grace so the dreadful Vengeance which the Lord hath executed against the Men of his Enmity and Warfare hath been most righteously procured by their clothing cursed designs of Revenge Persecution Bondage in Soul and Body Spoil and Rapine with the most glorious Pretences of Zeal Covenant and Reformation and such like things which never came into their Hearts Here the dear Brethren of the Presbytery as well as the Reprobate Cavaliers were Listed among the Enemies of the Cause and of the Church of God and now all People and all Parties in the three Kingdoms except onely the Army-Saints and their Adherents were become perfect Aegyptians And so they were upon this Account that the People of God had gain'd a certain Right to Rob and Plunder them by Divine Commission And here also you may observe that I.O. bold Man and God Almighty were always of the same side and the same Communion and whatever he was for was doubtless the Cause of God They were for Presbytery and Independency and Democracy together and never parted Counsels and Designs till the Lord grew weary of these right Godly Men and so was at length pleased to turn Cavalier And that upon good grounds for by this time his old Friends were become as bad or worse then his old Enemies For so the same Author informs us to mention but one place more though I omit as many as would make a Volume in a little Treatise of Temptation pag. 65 66. where giving an Account of the Temptations which in those days had even cast down the People of God from their Excellency and had cut their Locks and made them become like other Men he reckons in the first place the specious Pretence of Christian Liberty and Freedom from a Bondage-frame at which door sundry had gone out into Sensuality and Apostacy into a neglect of Sabbaths Publick and Private
Conditions of Society and will be preying upon the Lives and Liberties of their fellow Subjects they become publick Enemies to the common Good forfeit all Right of Protection and put themselves out of the benefit of the Laws Such is the outrage of these haughty men they are not content with their own just priviledges but assault those of their Neighbours and will not endure others to live in society with them unless they will yield up the Liberty of their Understandings to their imperious folly and no man shall be suffer'd to live in peace and quiet unless they may be allowed to usurp and exercise a supremacy of Power over the whole Communion and this is a direct subversion of the Authority of Government and a manifest violence to the Fundamental Laws and Conditions of Society and by consequence a Forfeiture of all Claims to its rights and priviledges And yet notwithstanding this savage and insociable humour they suffer not for that but only for their incorrigible stubbornness against the Laws of Government and Rules of Discipline And if they would learn to be modest and yield to be govern'd by any thing but their own intolerable peevishness they would seldom feel the severity of the Churches Discipline for the unmannerly rigour of their own Doctrines these are matters of our mutual forbearance and whatever may be the Opinions of private men our Church does not dogmatize in scholastick speculations and we must never expect to see peace re-enthroned in the Christian world till other Churches shall suffer themselves to be brought to the moderation of the Church of England to have as little Faith and as much Charity as the Primitive Christians But to contend for the same ease and indulgence as these men do in the Laws of Discipline as in the broils of Disputation is to cut the Nerves of all Ecclesiastical Government and remonstrate to all the Conditions of Church-Communion For it leaves every man at liberty to except himself from the Laws of the Society and therefore to conclude hereafter let them not tell us of their being Protestants unless they will satisfie us of their being governable And when that is done they may be secure to find from us more tenderness and moderation in case of their Dissent as to matters of Controversie and Opinion than we ever have found or ever expect to find from their waspish and cholerick humour As for what remains of my Discourse It is says the bold Objecter all resolved into a supposition that they who in any place or part of the world desire Liberty of Conscience for the Worship of God have indeed no Conscience at all For it is thereon supposed without further Evidence that they will thence fall into all wicked and unconscientious Practices This is down-right forgery too but yet 't is weak and modest if compared to the Boldness of his former Calumnies For 't is a small thing for him to pervert my sense by an ill-collected supposition that has wittingly falsified my express words and laid to my charge lewd Assertions of his own pure Contrivance However 't is a popular surmise and suited to the folly of the common People and that is enough to his purpose though the wise Surveyor himself can never be so short-sighted as not to see that the only supposition upon which I all along proceed was founded upon the clearest and most unquestionable experience of mankind viz. that all men are either not so wise as they would seem or not so honest as they would pretend that 't is a familiar thing even for well-meaning Persons to mistake humour and passion for Conscience that Fanaticism is as incident to the Common People as folly and ignorance and yet more mischievous to Government then Vice and Debauchery with divers other common and easie Observations of humane life from whence it is an obvious and natural deduction to conclude that men may easily run into tumults and seditions under mistakes of Conscience though they do not wittingly and out of design abuse its Pretences to wicked and mischievous practices but purely for want of knowledge and understanding in the nature of good and evil and the moral reasons of things whence it comes to pass that there are so few who do not or at least may not mistake their Vices for their Religion and mix their passions with their Zeal But because this suggestion is one of the great burthens of our Authors Complaint and is so pertly glanced at almost in every Paragraph and so industriously pursued upon every occasion I think my self obliged before I conclude to entertain the Reader with some farther Account how Conscience and Religion are the aptest and most suitable instruments to be employed for creating Publick Disturbances 1. First then they are the most usual mask and most plausible pretence to cover the basest and most unworthy ends Sacriledge and Rebellion ever shrowd themselves under the hatred of Superstition and Idolatry bare-faced villany has but an ugly look and has not confidence to shew it self to the World but in the disguise of Reformation The blackest Enterprizes could never have been attempted had they not put on the fairest Pretences for men cannot as the world now goes gain the opportunity of attempting any more enormous Wickedness but under popular shews and affectations of Sanctity and all the more exorbitant Crimes of Disloyalty that were ever committed in the World have shelter'd themselves under glorious Appearances of Godly Zeal The Cause of God is the best spur and stirrup too to the advancement of Ambitious men and there is no such easie way for them to exalt themselves above their Superiours and to trample upon their Equals as when they do it for the Glory of God Nothing else could have so long supported the Credit of his late Highness through so many Murthers Perjuries and manifest Villanies but his great dexterity in Praying and Preaching his counterfeit way of whining his dreadful Appeals and Protestations to Heaven and his great and extraordinary Communion with God And therefore this specious piece of Hypocrisie being so absolutely necessary to give reputation to the basest and most disloyal Actions Princes are thereby sufficiently warned to be jealous of those Designs that are usher'd in under this popular and plausible Pretence of Reformation and to be more watchful to suppress their Attempts than open outrages because it does not only disguise but gives Countenance to any mischief and makes the ugliest Projects appear fair and plausible to vulgar eyes It naturally dazzles and lures in the wild Multitude to any design and there is no way so easie to infuse into their heads an ill opinion of the present State as to inveigle them with conceits and jealousies of miscarriages in or designs upon their Religion No however they may out of a sense of the great duty of Obedience suffer Princes to waste and subvert their civil Liberties yet they must not endure them to encroach
upon the Rights of Religion So that there is no other effectual Artifice to decoy Christian Subjects into Mutiny and Rebellion but the taking Pretences of Godliness and Reformation They are all agreed in the Belief of the necessity of subjection to their lawful Superiours in all things that concern their civil rights but where the Glory of God and Purity of his Worship lie at stake there they must whet and sharpen their Zeal in his Cause and not betray the true Religion by their neglect and stupidity And let but a few crafty men whisper abroad their suspicions of Popery or any other hated name and the Rabble are immediately alarm'd and they will raise a War and embroil the Nation against an Heretical Word And to this Purpose their Leaders are ever provided with such jugling and seditious Maxims as effectually over-rule all Oaths of Allegiance and all Obligations to Obedience as that all Good Subjects may with just Arms at least defend themselves if question'd or assaulted for the cause of Religion though when they send their Armies into the Field they are as well arm'd with Offensive Weapons as their Enemies and are furnish'd with Swords and Musquets to annoy them as well as Shields and Bucklers to defend themselves That the maintenance of pure Religion passes an Obligation upon their Consciences of force enough to evacuate all Oaths and Contracts whatsoever that may stand in the way of its advancement and then how naturally does this not only warrant but enforce their Resistance to their Lawful Prince in defence of the cause of God and to extort the Free exercise of Religion by force of Arms which if they should lay down at his Command that were to betray the Gospel to the Power of its profess'd and implacable Enemies by their own neglect and cowardize Not that they fight against the King himself God forbid their intention is nothing else then to rescue him out of the Power and Possession of evil Counsellors You must not believe them such disloyal Wretches as to rebel against his Sacred Majesty alas they design nothing but the discharge of their Duty and Allegiance and though they take up Arms against his Person yet 't is in defence of his Crown and they fight against him in his Personal Capacity only to serve him in his Political That in the management and Reformation of Religion there is no respect to be had to carnal and worldly Wisdom and therefore when the Propagation of the Gospel lies at stake 't is but a vain thing for men to tie themselves to the Laws of Policy and Discretion Civil Affairs are to be conducted by secular Artifices but matters of the Church are to be directed purely by the Will of God the Warrant of Scripture and the Guidance of Providence Now what exorbitances will not this wild principle excuse and qualifie In all their disorderly and irregular Proceedings they do but neglect the Rules of carnal Policy for the better carrying on of the work of the Lord where there is no place for moderation and complyance and nothing must satisfie or appease their Zeal but a full Ratification of all their demands Though these and infinite other as vulgar Artifices are as old as Rebellion it self and though wise men can easily wash off their false Colours yet the Common People will suffer themselves to be abused by them to the end of the World partly because they are rash and heady and apt to favour all Changes and Innovations partly because they are foolish and credulous and apt to believe all fair and plausible stories but mainly because they are proud and envious and apt to suspect the Actions of their Superiours So easie a thing is it for your crafty Achitophels to arm Faction with Zeal and to draw the Multitude into Tumults and Seditions under colour of Religion whilst themselves have their designs and projects apart and influence the great turns of Affairs for their own private Ends and so manage the zealous fools as to make them work Journey-work to their ambition and imploy seditious Preachers to Gospellize their Conspiracies and sanctifie their Rapines and Sacriledges to display the piety of their Intentions and cry up the Interest of a State-faction for the Cause of God and sound an Alarm to Rebellion with the Trumpet of the Sanctuary § 15. Thus to omit the known Arts of the Grandees and Junto-men in our late Confusions were the Confederate Lords of France that involved their Native Country in such a long and bloody War during the Reign of four or five Kings at first to seek for a plausible pretence to secure and justifie their Resolution of taking up Arms against their lawful Sovereign till the Admiral Coligny hit upon that unhappy counsel to make themselves Heads of the Hugonot Faction and then they had not only a strong party to assert but a fair pretence to warrant the Rebellion And the War that was first set on foot by the envy and ambition of some Male-contents in the State was prosecuted with greater rage and fury by Zeal for the true Religion In all their Manifests and Declarations they protested for nothing with so much seeming Resolution as their Demands of Liberty and Indulgence for tender Consciences And when either Party fortun'd to be worsted they re-inforced themselves and their Cause by Religious Leagues and Covenants and then the heady multitude flowed into the assistance of the different Factions according to their different Inclinations So that by degrees to use the words of the Historian the discords of great men were confounded with the dissentions of Religion and the Factions were no more called the discontented Princes and the Guisarts but more truly and by more significant Names one the Catholique and the other the Hugonot Party Factions which under colour of Piety administred such pernicious matter to all the following mischiefs and distractions Which how sad and how tedious they were I need not inform you only this both Parties being balanced and successively encouraged by the inconstancy of Government the change of Interests of State and the windings of an ambitious Woman the publick Broils and Disorders were kept up through so many Kings Reigns and might have been perpetuated till this day had not the equality quality of the Factions been broken and the power and interest of the Hugonot Party absolutely vanquish't So that though these two opposite Parties might if let alone to themselves have lived peaceably together in the same Commonwealth yet when headed and encouraged by great Men in the State they immediately became two fighting Armies and when they were once enraged against each other by Zeal and Religion it was not possible for all the Arts of Policy to allay the storm but by the utter ruine and overthrow of one of the contending Factions Dissembled Pacifications and plaister'd Reconcilements proved more bloody and mischievous in the event than the Prosecution of an open War This would have
as the Capitol and you may sooner remove Mountains then shake their Confidence But is it not prodigious to see people so jocundly satisfied with a Book written with so much looseness as if its Author had either utterly forgot what I had utter'd or cared not what himself was to prove a Book wherein 't is hard to find a passage that is not coarsly false or impertinent and very few that are not apparently both a Book in which you shall meet with nothing singular and remarkable but horrid Untruths and Falsifications § 14. But however a Book he resolved to write without regard to Truth or Falshood and though he were not so lamentably costive as a late Brother of the scribling humour that was so far to seek for an Exordium that he was forced to take his rise at the day of the Moneth and the year of our Lord yet he was much more unhappy to make his entrance with such an awkerd acknowledgement as must for ever defeat and discredit the design of his whole performance by confessing that all his Pleas how solemn and serious soever he may appear are but dissembled and hypocritical Pretences When he tells us that 't is none of the least disadvantages of his Cause that he is enforced to admit a Supposition that those whom he pleads for are indeed really mistaken in their apprehensions But though this may seem a rash and unadvised Concession yet if you examine it you will find it a notable wily and cunning device For unless he will give place to such a Supposition or if he will rigidly contend that what he pleads in the behalf of is absolutely the Truth and that Obedience thereunto is the direct Will and Command of God there remains no proper Field for the Debate about Indulgence to be managed in For things acknowledged to be such are not capable of an Indulgence properly so called because the utmost Liberty that is necessary unto them is their right and due in strict Iustice and Law And yet the whole scope of his Apology and the onely Fundamental Principle upon which he builds is that they are obliged to do what they do out of Obedience to the Will and Command of God and by consequence the things they contend for are not capable of any Indulgence but are matters of indispensable duty and Divine right so that were the Government of Church-Affairs at their disposal they must establish the things that they desire to be indulged in as duties of strict Iustice and Law and restrain all other different forms and practices out of regard to the Divine Command and then to tolerate ours or any other way of Worship distinct from their own would be to permit men to live in open defiance to the direct Will and Command of God that has precisely injoyned a different Form of Worship So that it seems all pretences for Liberty of Conscience are but artificial Disguises for the advantage of farther Designs and when they gain it then the Mask falls off and the Scene is shifted and Petitions for Indulgence immediately swell up into Demands of Reformation So unfortunate is this Man in his whole performance that by all the Principles he has made use of to plead for Indulgence he is obliged to plead against it And there is not a more effectual Argument against Toleration of different Forms of Worship then their Fundamental Conceit that nothing ought to be practised or establish't in the Worship of God but what is precisely warranted and authorized in the Word of God For this restrains and disavows all Forms but one and ties all the Christian World to a nice and exact Conformity to that compleat and adequate Rule of Worship But suppose he were to speak to the Nature of the things themselves and not to the Apprehensions of them with whom he has to do Then farewel all soft and gentle Language and you shall hear nothing but Thundrings against Superstition Will-worship Episcopal Tyranny Popish Corruptions Rags of the Whore and the Dregs of the Romish Beast Then what is Prelacy but a meer Antichristian Encroachment upon the Inheritance of Christ And he that thinks Babylon is confined to Rome and its open Idolatry knows nothing of Babylon nor of the New Jerusalem the depth of a subtle mystery does not lie in gross visible folly it has been insinuating it self into all the Nations for 1600 years and to most of them is now become as the marrow in their bones before it be wholly shaken out these Heavens must be dissolved and the Earth shaken i. e. as he expounds both himself and the Text the setled and establish't Government of the West must be subverted Their Tall Trees i. e. Kings and Princes hewed down and set a howling and the residue of them transplanted from one end of the Earth to the other Or as the same Author expresses himself upon another occasion The Heavens and the Earth of the Nations must be shaken because in their present Constitution they are directly framed to the Interest of Antichrist which by notable advantages at their first moulding and continued insinuations ever since hath so rivetted it self into the very Fundamentals of them that no digging or mining with an Earthquake will cast up the Foundation-stones thereof And therefore the Lord Iesus having promised the service of the Nations to his Church will so far open their whole frame to the roots as to pluck out all the cursed seeds of the Mystery of Iniquity which by the craft of Satan and exigences of State or methods of advancing the pride and power of some Sons of Blood have been sown amongst them And then abundance of Scripture and dark Prophesie is pour'd forth to make good these mild and peaceable Doctrines It is the great day of the wrath of the Lamb. The Land shall be soked with blood and the dust made fat with fatness for it is the day of the Lords vengeance and the year of recompence for the Controversie of Zion All the Kings of the earth have given their power to Antichrist endeavouring to the utmost to keep the Kingdom of Christ out of the World What I pray has been their main business for 700 years and upward even almost ever since the Man of Sin was enthroned How have they earned the Titles Eldest Son of the Church The Catholick and most Christian King Defender of the Faith Hath it not been by the blood of the Saints And now will not the Lord avenge his Elect that cry unto him day and night will he not do it speedily Will he not call the Fowls of Heaven to eat the Flesh of Kings and Captains and great Men of the Earth Rev. 19.18 All this must be done to cast down all opposition to the Kingdom of the Lord Christ and to advance it to its Glory and Power That consists mainly of these three things that he there reckons 1. Purity and Beauty of Ordinances and Gospel-worship
Vanity of his Attempt who would demonstrate out of the Canticles that the Saints enjoy distinct Communion with the three Persons of the Trinity it exasperates some bold and confident Men that are fond of their own thin and crazy Conceits as much as if we should pervert the first Chapter of St. Iohn's Gospel And we scoff at Justification by Faith if we despise a Thousand vain and empty Speculations wherewith they have involved that Article As whether Faith justifies from any peculiar Excellency of its own nature or barely from the Divine Appointment whether it be an instrumental Cause of Justification or onely a Procatarctick Cause if instrumental whether an active or a passive Instrument if Procatarctick whether Procatarctick formal or Procatarctick objective with a multitude more of the like wise and important Enquiries that could never have enter'd into the most curious and whimsical Understanding had not some idle people loved to amuse themselves with inventing profound and curious Nothings and had not one Keckerman and some other dull Fellows been at leisure to write foolish Books of Logick and Metaphysicks whose Theorems must be blended with the Doctrines and Propositions of St. Paul and then Mens little Quarrels about this Motley-Divinity must make new Sects and Opinions in Religion and they must measure the Orthodoxy of their Faith by their subtilty in wrangling and their power in disputing by their skill and dexterity in Terms of Art and by their being able to understand the precise and Orthodox Notion of a Procatarctick Cause These are the useful and wonderful Profundities to which the disputing Men of this Age are such zealous Votaries they value their Learning by their skill in these dry and sapless Enquiries and their Agility in the Combats of Disputation and a Disputant with them signifies the same thing as a great Scholar To this purpose they furnish their Memories with abundance of notional Querks and Subtilties to keep up their pert and talkative Humour and spend all their time in learning Distinctions that may maintain and reconcile palpable Contradictions With what fetches of Wit will they distinguish themselves round about till they come at last to affirm what at first they denied And with what severity of Judgment will they spin out a long train of wary Aphorisms and subtile Propositions to prove that 't is Faith alone that justifies and yet so explain the Notion of justifying Faith as to make it imply and include in it all other parts of the Condition of the New Covenant i. e. Good Works and those that are able Divines can write whole Volumes of Problems and Disputations to make out this important Mystery That Faith alone justifies i. e. as 't is not alone And now if you compare the vanity of the Opinions with the talkative Humour of the Opiniators you will cease to wonder at their rude Carriage toward persons that profess to pursue more useful and less difficult Studies they are brim-full of talk and no Man that pretends to Learning can come in their way but they immediately engage him in Disputation and if he with some Railery expose their learned and studied Ignorance and confute the silliness of their Systematick Notions 't is a bold affront to the Orthodox Faith and he drolls upon the most Fundamental Articles of Divinity for they lay no less weight upon their own Subtilties and singular Conceits then on the plain and practical Precepts of the Gospel so that you cannot sweep away their Cobwebs but down drops the whole Fabrick of Religion Neither does this pragmatical Humour run onely among the Pretenders to Learning but the Infection spreads among the People every sage Trades-man sets up for a deep and an able Divine and talks as confidently of Predestination as if he had served his Apprenticeship to a Dutch Professour Every zealous Shop-keeper understands the management of Ecclesiastical Discipline as well as the Nicene Fathers and a Jury of Button-sellers shall determine a Controversie of Faith with more assurance then a General Council These of all others are the fiercest and most implacable Assertors because their Zeal is proportion'd to their Ignorance and therefore you cannot make your self pleasant with their pert and conceited Pedantry and 't is a piece of Railery that is hardly to be forborn but you draw upon your self whole Volleys of Anathema's and hard Names they can endure any Indignity rather then an affront to their Clerkship and you may with more safety play with a Spaniard's Beard then sport with their grave Ignorance That is an Insolence that can never pass unrevenged but your Reputation is immediately stabbed with some ugly word or poisoned with some malicious Report and it becomes the great business of their Zeal to brand you with foul imputations and in all places and upon all occasions to blazon abroad your gross Errours and your horrid Blasphemies This short Character of their Humour may serve for a satisfactory account of their dirty and disingenuous Demeanour towards such persons as pretend to so much knowledge as to despise the Ignorance of their Learning I design it not for an Apology either for my self or any of my Friends I know none so poor-spirited as to stand in awe of such petty Arts the most pertinent Reply to such a poor and beggarly Malice is Neglect and Disdain though in truth such Wretches as stick not upon every slight occasion to sacrifice not onely our Good-Names but our Livelyhoods for that is our Case to their own Childish Picks deserve to be answered by the Pillory and the Whipping-Post § 8. Many other ugly Insinuations he has as if I were prompted to this Undertaking by lewd and naughty Intentions or as if he knew some Stories that he can but out of Tenderness and Civility to my Reputation will not vent I will not so much assist his Malice as to transcribe all his white-liver'd Suggestions to this purpose but whether in this way of proceeding he has discover'd more Boldness or more Imprudence is hard to determine when he knows himself to lie under such vast disadvantages at this Weapon by lying open to so many stabbing and inevitable Hits But this is one of their Topicks and comes in by the Rules of their Method and Ingenuity and all the Defenders and Champions of the Church of England have ever been thus accosted by their civil and unpassionate Adversaries And never did any Man give them a smart and severe Blow but immediately they threatned to tell Tales And where Men have not the advantage of Truth Calumny is their best and surest Weapon For though its Wounds do not always fester yet they usually leave a scar behind them at least he gains the Advantage of his Enemy that gives him the diversion to wipe off Reproaches and all Apologies in defence of a Man 's own Innocence leave behind them through the common Ill-nature of Mankind some ill-contrived suspicion of Guilt in the Minds of Men. And therefore I
Authority to a proud and an insolent Humour This is the plain and real account of my state of the Controversie and if any Man can determine it upon more reasonable more moderate and more discernable Principles I am not so fond of my own Conceptions as to be unwilling to subscribe to wiser Proposals But these things I have accounted for more at large in the last Chapter of my former Treatise where I have in many particulars shewn the horrible vanity of pretending dissatisfaction of Conscience against the Commands of lawful Authority And had not our Author rather design'd to prolong than to determine this Dispute in stead of his wild rambling up and down without drift or method he would with a more particular Regard have faln upon that part of my Discourse but its Examination would have been of immediate Concern to his own Pretences and would have brought the Controversie to too speedy an Issue and perhaps too satisfactory a Decision and therefore he baulks that as too hazardous an Enterprize and is unwilling to venture the whole Cause upon one Engagement but keeps this back as a Reserve for a second Onset and for matter of new Cavil at present it suffices for his purpose which is not to satisfie but to shuffle with his Readers to load my more general Assertions with such loose and uncertain Cavils as are already prevented in my more particular Determinations of the Enquiry § 10. But though this way of abuse be one would think bold enough yet in the next attempt his Confidence improves and it were hard fortune if he should prove Bankrupt upon so fair a Stock before he did but overlook my plain meaning but now he proceeds to pervert and slander it and his peevishness becomes malice He is not content to abuse the People with dull mistakes and to defeat the efficacy of my Discourse upon the Minds of Men by disturbing its method and representing its whole design in such an awkard and disorderly manner as may utterly confound and perplex their thoughts as to my drift and meaning This alas is mean revenge and is not full enough of mischief to appease his wrath it onely calls my Understanding into question and exposes my Wit to the Cavils and Impertinencies of talking People and therefore he roundly charges me with the blackest and most horrid Tenets he aggravates and sets off their horrour with infinite Repetitions for that is the most lofty strain of their Eloquence and the Figure that moves the Passions of their Multitude and employs all the forces of slander and peevishness to raise popular rage and indignation The Result of his Indictment is that I assert such Opinions from whence it follows that whatever the Magistrate commands in Religion his Authority does so immediately affect the Consciences of Men that they are bound to observe it on pain of the greatest Sin and Punishment or as he expresses the same thing elsewhere that no Man must do or practise any thing in the Worship of God but what is prescribed appointed and commanded by the Magistrate upon pain of Sin Schism Rebellion and all that follows thereon These are big words indeed but if it shall appear that this Charge is not so loud and black as 't is false and disingenuous I will give him the Liberty of an Appeal to all Mankind for the clearing of his Integrity and when I have represented upon what slight grounds he raises this great and heinous Accusation I doubt not but his disingenuity will appear so palpable and notorious that it will expose him at least to the pity of the most Zealous She of his own Congregation And therefore let us see by what mighty Topicks and Testimonies he makes good so high a Charge In the first place my Title Page rises up in Judgment against me and never was poor Man so all-be-confuted with a Title Page as I have been viz. That the Magistrate has Power over the Consciences of his Subjects in Religion and to strengthen this Testimony two other Propositions are join'd with it viz. That the Magistrate has Power to govern and conduct their Consciences in Religious Affairs and that Religion is subject to his Dominion as well as all other Affairs of State And now though these are none of my primary and Fundamental Assertions which an ingenuous Adversary would chiefly have pursued but honest and well-meaning Sayings that the Context would abundantly warrant and justifie yet will I for ever yield my self a baffled Fellow if from thence any Female or Independent Logick can infer either that the Magistrate has an unlimited Power over or passes an immediate Obligation upon the Consciences of Men or in our Authors own words That whatever the Magistrate commands in Religion his Authority does so immediately affect the Consciences of Men that they are bound to observe it on the pain of the greatest sin and punishment This trash neither needs nor deserves any further severity and therefore I will onely leave it to the Readers thoughts to consider by what Art and in what Method of Reasoning this Conclusion may be created out of these Premises an allmighty Confidence may attempt much and perhaps do it too but yet some things there are beyond the reach and power of Omnipotence it self and I know nothing more absolutely impossible than to produce Sense out of Non-sense or what is the same thing to make good the Reasonableness of false and unreasonable Inferences But from this great head of Impertinency he proceeds to his more serviceable Topick of Forgery and if he cannot bring the Mountain to Mahomet 't is no great difficulty to carry Mahomet to the Mountain and if his Conclusions will not suit with my Assertions he knows how to make my Assertions suit with his Conclusions and when he has charged me with a false Inference 't is an admirable way to justifie the Logick of his Calumny by forged Premises And thus to make good his former Inference of my ascribing to the Civil Magistrate an immediate and universal Power over the Consciences of Men he tells his believing Reader I have affirmed pag. 27. That 't is a Soveraignty over Mens Consciences in Matters of Religion and this universal absolute and uncontroulable Though this Calumny were true yet so injudicious is our Authors Invention 't is monstrously impertinent for there is no imaginable ground to conclude from hence That the Supreme Authority immediately affects the Consciences of Men For suppose the Civil Magistrate instated in an absolute and uncontroulable Power what necessity is there that their Commands should tie themselves upon our Consciences by vertue of their own immediate Authority Nay 't is impossible any thing should immediately affect the Conscience but the Authority of God and 't is by vertue of his Command that any other Commands can pass an Obligation upon it and therefore though the Commands of the Civil Magistrate should pass an universal Obligation upon the
mouth 't is but crying out The Cause of God and popular zeal is immediately in Arms and Mutiny do but tell them the Gospel lies at stake and the Rabble will die Martyrs to their own Credulity This sacred Imposture will as much secure their Obedience as the Roman Discipline and the Roman Legions could never be more forward for the glory of the Common-wealth then the Congregational Churches will be for the Beauty and Purity of Christs Ordinances And such has ever been the boldness of this man he scorns to vouch any less warrantable Commission for his own Dreams and Fancies than the express and immediate Commands of divine Authority all his singularities must be Gospellized and all his seditious Doctrines broach'd out of St. Paul The wisdom of God must be prostituted to his folly and boldness the Word of God prophaned to authorize his pride and zealous madness all his phanatick Pranks must be charged upon the Scriptures and he has a Text for every extravagant Attempt and whatever the Principles of Reason and common Honesty cannot account for the old Prophets shall not only foretel but sanctifie And perhaps never did all the Prophane Wits in the World make more bold with the Word of God than this daring man there is scarce any more remarkable Text in the whole Bible that he has not turn'd into Ridicule he can guard every thing he says and does with files of Chapter and Verse as it were with Pikes and Protestations and can draw up Remonstrances and Declarations as well as Primers out of the Word of God in brief with him every thing is Scripture Scripture is every thing And this is the true Mystery of all our Schisms and Divisions it is not their Contest about Ceremonies and things Indifferent but it is their Pulpit-talk about the Cause of God and the Gospel that transports the Peoples Zeal and there still things are so represented as if they alone were the People of God and we the professed Enemies of the Lord Christ and the least thing they will say when they are most cool and moderate is that we are revolted from the Purity of the Gospel to Superstition and Will-worship and that there is no Beauty and Purity of Ordinances but in their Meetings and Conventicles The Fox in the Fable says I. O. had a thousand wiles to save himself from the Hunters but the Cat knew unum magnum one great thing that would surely do it Earthly supports and contentments are but a thousand failing wiles which will all vanish in the time of need The Gospel and Christ in the Gospel is that unum magnum that unum necessarium which alone will stand us in any stea◠Our Adversaries may discourse like Politicians and make a thousand pretences for the necessity of Uniformity in order to the peace and security of Government but we will trust to one great pretence the Command of God and the Cause of the Gospel and that with the People will do our business more effectually than all their Stratagems of Policy § 6. And thus is it our Authors present design to enlarge and prolong the Controversie and to set up new Mormo's in our Churches to fray away the People from our Communion though they all run themselves into the same Principle that the VVord of God is the adequate Rule of the VVorship of God yet the very appearance of number is no little security to the Cause and satisfaction to the Proselytes and though they are but so many several Repetitions of the same thing yet that makes a shew that they have a great deal to say for themselves and that is enough And thus were our Author put upon the proof of these general Maxims here by him laid down he would and must wholly setle himself upon this bottom Let us briefly examine them the two first are 1. Whatever the Scripture has indeed prescribed and appointed to be done and observed in the Worship of God and the Government of the Church that is indeed to be done and observed 2. That nothing in conjunction with or addition unto what is so appointed ought to be admitted if it be contrary to the general Rules or particular preceptive Instructions of the Scripture VVhere you may observe that these Maxims are such as they will adhere unto and stand upon in the management of the Plea as to the differences between us So that their plain meaning as applied to their present contest with the Church of England is that the Nonconformists way of VVorship is prescribed and appointed in the VVord of God whereas our Additions to it are contrary either to the general Rules or particular Instructions of Scripture and if this be not the design of these Propositions they are no other way pertinent to the management of this Plea And now are not these admirable Principles to be pleaded in an Apology for Liberty of Conscience The Governours of the Nation are bound to indulge us in our different Practices and Perswasions about the VVorship of God because there is but one particular Form allowable only that which is prescribed and injoin'd in the VVord of God and that is ours and therefore are they and all the Princes of Christendom tied up to an exact Conformity to that Rule and not to endure any other Forms that deviate from its Prescription unless they will tolerate Men in an open and avowed violation of the Law of God So unhappy is this Man as still to turn his own VVeapons upon himself and stab his Cause in its own defence as desperate Men chuse to die by their own hands that they may escape their Enemies Swords He could not have invented a Principle more expresly destructive of his own Pretences for if nothing be lawful in the Worship of God but what is prescribed in the Word of God and if nothing that is unlawful may be tolerated by the Civil Magistrate and if there be but one particular Form appointed in the Word of God it cannot avoid to be concluded that all others are unlawful and by consequence intolerable And thus are the Tables turned and now the state of the Controversie is not whether both Parties may be safely and innocently tolerated no but whether they or we onely they says he because their way of Worship is indispensably prescribed and appointed by God himself not we because ours is contrary to his own Rules and Prescriptions and therefore the case is plain it ought to be abolish't without mercy or delay unless Men may be permitted by connivence of Publick Authority to contradict the express Will of God under pretence of his own Worship But if this be our case there is no remedy but we must hereafter play a new Game in our own defence They that declare they will give no Quarter have no reason to expect any And this is a mighty aggravation of these Mens former miscarriages and present impenitence that they can be so bold
declared by what they have done and what they are desirous to do That the true state of the Cause and Quarrel is Religion in Reformation whereof they are so forward and zealous that there is nothing expressed in the Scots Declarations former or later which they have not seriously taken to heart and endeavoured to effect c. And in a Letter from the Assembly of Divines to them by order of the House of Commons they call it twice The Cause of Religion And the Assembly in answer to the Parliament desire it may be more and more cleared Religion to be the true state of the differences in England and to be uncessantly prosecuted first above all things giving no sleep to their eyes or slumber to their eye-lids until it be setled In their Declaration and Protestation to the whole World Octob. 22. 1642. They are fully convinced that the Kings Resolutions are so engaged to the Popish Party for the suppression and extirpation of the true Religion that all hopes of peace and protection are excluded that it is fully intended to give satisfaction to the Papists by alteration of Religion c. That great means are made to take up the differences betwixt some Princes of the Roman Religion that so they might unite their strength to the extirpation of the Protestant Cause wherein principally this Kingdom and the Kingdom of Scotland are concerned as making the greatest Body of the Reformed Religion in Christendom c. For all which Reasons we are resolved to enter into a Solemn Oath and Covenant with God to give up our Selves our Lives and Fortunes into his hands and that we will to the utmost of our Power and Judgment maintain his Truth and conform our selves to his Will And in the Declaration upon the Votes of no further Address to be made to the King by themselves or any one else Feb. 17. 1647. the Lords and Commons make Religion one of the great Motives upon which they proceeded for say they the torture of our Bodies by most cruel Whippings slitting of Noses c. might be the sooner forgotten had not our Souls been Lorded over led captive into Superstition and Idolatry triumphed over by Oaths ex Officio Excommunications Ceremonious Articles new Canons Canon-Oaths c. p. 19. And in the last Paper to the Scotch Commissioners Feb. 24. 1648. they declare that the Army of the Houses of Parliament were raised for maintenance of the true Religion and that they invited them to come to their assistance and declared the true state of the Quarrel to be Religion and they earnestly desire the General Assembly to further and expedite the assistance desired from the Kingdom of Scotland upon this ground and motive that thereby they shall do great service to God and great honour may redound to themselves by becoming Instruments of a Glorious Reformation c. This was the stile of all their Papers from 42 to 48 till some of the Grandees of the Independent Faction had by their hypocritical Prayers malicious Preachings counterfeit Tears unmanly Whinings false Protestations and execrable Perjuries scrued themselves up into a Supremacy of Power and Interest and then they alter'd the stile of their Pretences with the change of their Affairs and suited their Remonstrances to their Fortunes and so stopt not at their old demands of Reformation and purity of Ordinances these Pretexts were too low for the greatness of their Attempts and Resolutions and were not sufficient to warrant the Murther of their lawful Sovereign and therefore it was necessary for them to take up with new Pleas suitable to the wickedness of their new Purposes and then nothing was big enough to Arreign or Condemn their Prince but the Charge of Treason and Tyranny and the Sentence of Death was passed and executed upon him as a publick Enemy to the Commonwealth So that though Pretences of Secular and Political Interest were necessary to cut off his Head yet it was purely Zeal and Reformation that brought him to the Block To these Declarations from the Press I might add their Declarations from the Pulpit their Preachers incessantly encouraging the People to fight against the King as the most acceptable service to God and the People accordingly fought against him because they were perswaded that he was a Papist and would bring in Popery that the Common-Prayer was the Mass in English Organs were Idolatry and Episcopacy Antichristian It was nothing but the purity of the Gospel to which they so cheerfully sacrificed their Thimbles and Bodkins And though here it were easie to collect vast Volumes there being scarce a Parliament-exercise for which the Preacher had the Thanks of the House in which some sands and sweat were not wasted in crying up the piety of their Intentions for the Reformation of Gospel-Ordinances But because this would prove a Work too Voluminous I will therefore put off my Reader and satisfie my Adversary too with two or three passages out of the inspired Homilies of I. O. in his several Dispensations In his Sermon preached before the Parliament April 29. 1646. he thus bespeaks them From the beginning of these Troubles Right Honourable you have held forth Religion and the Gospel as whose Preservation and Restauration was principally in your Aims and I presume malice it self is not able to discover any insincerity in this the fruits we behold proclaim to all the Conformity of your Words and Hearts Now the God of Heaven grant that the same mind be in you still in every particular Member of this Honourable Assembly in the whole Nation especially in the Magistracy and Ministry of it that we be not like the Boat-men look one way and row another cry Gospel and mean the other thing Lord Lord and advance our own ends that the Lord may not stir up the staff of his anger and the rod of his indignation against us as an hypocritical People And Feb. 28. 1649. he tells them again Gods Work whereunto ye are ingaged is the propagating of the Kingdom of Christ and the setting up of the Standard of the Gospel And Octob. 13. 1652. From the beginning of the Contests in this Nation when God had caused your Spirits to resolve that the Liberties Priviledges and Rights of this Nation wherewith you were intrusted should not by his assistance be wrested out of your hands by Violence Oppression and Injustice this he also put upon your hearts to vindicate and assert the Gospel of Jesus Christ his Ways and his Ordinances against all Opposition though you were but inquiring the way to Sion for then they were little better than Presbyterians with your faces thitherwardâ— God secretly entwining the Interest of Christ with yours wrapt up with you the whole Generation of them that seek his face and prosper'd your Affairs on that account And lastly Feb. 4. 1658. Give me leave to remember you as one that had opportunity to make Observations of the passages of Providence in those
days in all the three Nations in the times of our greatest hazards give me leave I say to remember you that the Publick Declarations of those imployed in the Affairs of this Nation in the face of the Enemies their Addresses unto God among themselves their Prayers night and day their private Discourses one with another were that the Preservation of the Interest of Christ in and with his People was the great thing that lay in their eyes c. I must not detain you with Observations upon these passages and they are so plain I need not this is enough to send him to School to his own dumb-speaking Egyptian Hieroglyphick with which he once thought he could stop the mouths of the malignant Infidels that would not be brought to believe the Success at Celchester an ample Testimony of the continuance of Gods Presence with the Army 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Men of all sorts know that God hateth Impudence § 8. But how ill soever the People of God may have behaved themselves in time of yore they are now resolved to learn better manners for says our Author and who will not take his word Do they profess 't is their Duty their Principle their Faith and Doctrine to be obedient to their Rulers and Governours Do they offer all the security of their adherence to such declared Principles as Mankind is necessitated to be satisfied with in things of their highest Concernment c. All is one every different Opinion is Press-money and every Sect is an Army although they be all and every one of them Protestants of whom alone we do discourse You offer Security for your Allegiance You that have violated all the Obligations of Oaths Covenants and Protestations Shall Bankrupts of all Faith and Honesty expect to be trusted upon their bare words that have so often proved perfidious to their Oaths Men whose coy and crazy Consciences have sworn and swallowed naked and undisguised Contradictions are capable no doubt of giving wonderful assurance and satisfaction for their future Fidelity First give us some competent Tokens of your Repentance before you presume to tender us any Security of your Allegiance Men that own the peculiar and distinguishing Principle of your Party are not fit to be trusted or endured in any Commonwealth viz. That Sovereign Princes may forfeit their Title to their Crowns and that 't is in the power of Subjects to depose them for the ill Administration of Government By this pretence you justified all your late Disloyal practices by it you adjudged his late Majesty to death by it you banish't the undoubted Heir of the Crown by it you proceeded to subvert the old and erect a new Form of Government and by it you all along confirm'd your selves in your Zeal and Opposition to the Royal Interest Now what signs have you given us of your having renounced this Principle of Rebellion And till you have what assurance can you give us of your Return to Loyalty seeing 't is not possible for any Oaths to bind you to your Duty whenever you have a mind to pick Quarrels against the management of publick Affairs Come come Sir shuffle no longer with us nor with your own Consciences Either your proceedings in the late Confusions were great and enormous Crimes or they were not if they were not nothing can restrain you whenever you gain the advantage of power and opportunity from acting such things over again as you seriously believe to be just and innocent if they were why have you not all this while given us some competent and reasonable assurance of your Conversion Your Crimes if Crimes at all were heinous and publick and enhansed with all the Aggravations of guilt and wickedness a flourishing Kingdom was embroil'd in Wars and Desolations a pious and vertuous Prince was villanously murther'd his Children banish't to preserve their Lives his Friends undone with Rapine and Sequestration and adjudged to death for their Zeal and Fidelity to his Service thousands of his Subjects lost and sacrificed in the Quarrel with innumerable other mischiefs and enormities and all this carried on with mighty shews and confident brags of Zeal and Piety These are sins with a witness and so full of horrour and amazement that they are not to be repented of with an ordinary Contrition and 't is not possible that any Man should be seriously convinced of his own guilt in such prodigious Crimes without the deepest Accents and Agonies of remorse or that he should appease his Conscience with any less satisfaction than publick Acknowledgment much less that he should expect other Men should trust the sincerity of his Repentance without some visible Indications of his amendment But alas so far are you from affording us any tolerable grounds to expect your change that you give us nothing but symptoms of reprobate hardness and instead of open and ingenuous Confessions either wholly blaunch the matter or extenuate the Crime or which is unpardonable Insolence discharge the guilt of all your practices upon our heads hereafter therefore forbear to think us such Sots unless you imagine our Skulls are stuft with wet Straw as to accept of any Security you can offer till you have first satisfied us of your hearty and unfeigned return to Principles of Loyalty and Allegiance And till then it were a shameful forfeiture of common discretion if we do not still suppose you the same Men we have ever found you Wolves they say may change their hairs but not their hearts and 't is an easie matter for Men so exercised in the Arts of Hypocrisie to cast their outward pretences without ever altering their thoughts and inward designs And yet they avoid the very appearances of alteration insomuch that nothing is more cried up among themselves than an undaunted adherence to their old Principles and their old Cause and if any of the Party chance to be so ingenuous as to confess the Errour and Crime of his Rebellion he is sure to be loaded with all the Reproaches of Apostasie and branded with all the dishonour of a Renegado And 't is well known into what deep Arrears of their Anger and Displeasure one has lately run himself by a few gentle and friendly reproofs of their Schismatical Behaviour What if he had exhorted them to repent of the Sins of Disloyalty and Rebellion and had charged it upon their Ingenuity to give some remarkable Evidences and Engagements of their better Resolutions as a worthy Requital of his Majesties Favour and Indempnifying the Outrage of all their former Proceedings If he had he would have been pelted with more dirty Language than the Pope of Rome or the Apocalyptick Beast They are stubborn and implacable in their old Principles their Minds are still possessed with the same accursed Rage and Bitterness of Spirit as ran them upon their late Rebellions and they are so little affected with any sense or sorrow for their Disloyalty that like men given up to a reprobate sense
Gibellines another Party of professed Enemies to the Church of England But to take down the Confidence of these forward Pretenders and to give a more distinct and satisfactory Account of this Affair you may know that our Reformation consists of two parts Doctrine and Discipline the design of the former was to abolish the corruptions and innovations of the Church of Rome and to retrieve the pure and primitive Christianity and the design of the latter was to abrogate the Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome and to annex all Superiority and Preheminence over the Ecclesiastical State to the Imperial Crown in both which attempts the Non-conformists or Puritan-Recusants have absolutely forsaken our Communion 1. As to Discipline The design of those great men that first arose to that great work was to redeem the Christian World from the shameless and exorbitant Usurpations of the Bishop of Rome that had invaded the Thrones of Princes and made their Scepters do homage to St. Peters Keys and enslav'd the Royal Dignity to the Interests and Insolences of a proud Vicar And this was the Schism of the Church of England its defection to its lawful Prince and its first departure from the Church of Rome was nothing but its Revolt to its due Allegiance and at this day its greatest Heresie is the uncatholick Doctrine of Obedience to Sovereign Authority Whereas the great project of the men of the Separation was never to abrogate but only to exchange the Papal Usurpation and to setle that Power and Supremacy of which they stript his Holiness of Rome upon the Presbyterial Consistory The Holy Discipline is but another name for the Papal Power it equally disrobes Princes of their Ecclesiastical Supremacy and entirely setles its Jurisdiction upon the Presbytery and vests them with an Authority to controul their Commands restrain their Civil Power and punish their Persons in that by the Principles of the Holy Discipline Kings must be subject to the Decrees of the Presbytery in all matters of Religion neither small nor great may be exempted from subjection to the Scepter of Iesus Christ by which they mean the same thing that the Papists do by the Keys of St. Peter viz. an Original Power in themselves of exercising a temporal Jurisdiction over the Kings of the Earth under pretence of their Spiritual Sovereignty So that in this part of the work we have not been encountred with more disturbance and opposition from the Jesuites than from the Presbyterians that are as to the Doctrine of Regal Supremacy as arrant Recusants and therefore it as much imports Princes for security of their own Rights and Prerogatives to have an eye to the Factors of Geneva as to the Emissaries of Rome They are both men of bold and fiery spirits and all the late Combustions of Europe have either been procured or occasion'd by the seditious and aspiring attempts of these two daring Sects But the Tumults and disorders of the Jesuites concern not our present Enquiry nor may I enter upon the History of all the Leagues Conspiracies Seditions Spoils Ravages and Insurrections of the Puritan Brethren It has been lately performed by an Elegant Pen to purpose that has thereby done that Right to the Cause of Reformation as to absolve the true Protestant from the Charge of Seditious Doctrines and Practices and to score all the Embroilments of the Kingdoms and Estates of Christendom on the Account of the Calvinists who thrust themselves into all Places and Designs and if any where they were suffer'd to grow into any considerable strength and Interest were upon all occasions drawing in the zealous Rabble into holy Leagues and Confederacies against their Governours And if you will but compare the first practices and proceedings of the Hugonots in the Kingdom of France of the Gheuses in the Belgick Provinces of the Kirk-faction in the Realm of Scotland with the Actings Treasons and Disloyalties of the English Puritans as you will discover a strange agreement in the issues of their principles and proceedings so you will find their disorders to exceed the common mischiefs and exorbitancies of Mankind But I must not pursue particular Stories the History of their Tumults Outrages and Desolations would require a larger Volume than the Book of Martyrs It was these hot and fiery Spirits that in most places spoil'd this gallant Enterprize and by their seditious Zeal and madness drove up the Reformation into down-right Rebellion and were so outragious against the Church of Rome that they had not patience to wait the lazy temper of Authority for the Reformation of Abuses It s Wisdom and Moderation was Carnal Policy and if Governours would not set upon it in regular and peaceable ways at their first alarm then the only Doctrine they thunder'd from the Pulpit was That if Princes refuse to reform Religion themselves 't is lawful for their godly Subjects to do it though by violence and force of Arms. These are the Men that are so forward to thrust themselves into the Reformed Communion and whom we are so resolved to disclaim as shameful Apostates from the Reformed Cause and judge just such Protestants as the Gnosticks were Christians the scandal and dishonour of their Profession and whom the true Sons of the Church were forced to avoid as much if not more than Heathens and Infidels though it were only to secure their own Reputation that their Tumults and Disorders might not be scored upon their Reckoning This is plain matter of Fact though how it will relish with our Author 't is easie to foretel and it is not to be doubted but he may have the confidence to remonstrate to the most credible evidence of History that has the boldness in defiance to so many publick Ordinances and Declarations to deny that the Pretences of Reformation had any concern in our late Confusions But however he would be well-advised not to dare to Apologize for other Men unless he could first clear his own innocence for if a Man shall undertake to plead the Cause of a notorious Offender that stands himself chargeable of the deeper guilt he does not defend but betray and upbraid his Client his very Apology becomes a strong Accusation and all the World will suspect that Mans innocence when they shall see a person so scandalous so forward in his defence He is but an ill Apologist for the peaceableness or Loyalty of any Party that has himself been a famous Trumpeter not to say a great Commander in Rebellion and when our late Thirsty Tyrants had gorged themselves with Royal Blood was the first Chaplain that proffer'd his service to say a long Margarets Grace to the Entertainment § 11. This short account may suffice to let you see that the Nonconformists as to this particular however they may glory in the Name of Protestant are but another sort of Papists that pluckt down one Popery to set up another and justled his Holiness out of the Chair only to seat themselves in it
virulent as when they are inveighing against the Church-Revenues they are strangely fluent upon this Theme and 't is their Everlasting Argument For here their Envy settles upon its proper Object nothing dazzles them more then Riches because they value nothing more and they can endure any thing in a Clergy-man with some patience rather then a fair Revenue and they scarce account any true Ministers of the Gospel but Lecturers and such other Mercenary Preachers as subsist entirely upon the Benevolence and arbitrary Pensions of the Good People With them 't is the most glorious piece of Reformation to make the Priesthood vile and sordid and to disrobe them of all secular Priviledges and Dignities is to bring them to the Pattern of Christ and his Apostles And 't is the Duty of Christian Princes to keep the Clergy in as mean and despised a Condition as they were reduced to by the Persecution of Heathen Emperours and to suffer themselves to be abused is the indispensable Duty of the Ministers of the Gospel and Contempt and Poverty are the peculiar Ornaments of a Ministerial Spirit All Ecclesiastical Grandeur is Popish and Antichristian but in all Protestant Churches their Godly Ministers are content with a Poor and Beggarly Competence In brief they deem Contempt and Penury as good Qualifications for the Priestly Office as some not long since thought Ignorance and Ill-Manners and to allow them a just and honourable Maintenance is to make them Hirelings and Loyterers But though this be their hard Reckoning with the whole Profession yet their own Minister poor Man is sure to pay the Shot and they seldom fail to wreak their Zeal and Indignation upon him 'T is a shame to observe how industrious some of them are to thwart and affront him upon all occasions and how studious of all opportunities to provoke him with open Insolencies and Indignities With what Malapertness will they censure his Sermons carp at his Expressions and condemn his Doctrines With what Insolence will they pity his Ignorance and Insufficiency And when they vouchsafe him their Company 't is not so much to be instructed in their Duty as to pick Quarrels and make Exceptions to his Discourses Though the truth is in this piece of modesty they are out-stript by the She-Professours Every conceited Dame that drives a Trade of Gossipping from House to House to tattle of Religion though for no other design then to gratifie her Itch of Talking and to this purpose has always at her Tongues end and her Religion seldom lies deeper Melancholy Complaints of the Hypocrisie of her Heart her Deadness in Duties her Wandrings in Prayer and her Unprofitableness under the Means of Grace and other sad Stories that she has learn't by roat Yet after all this puling and seeming Humility 't is neither unusual nor altogether unpleasant to observe with what arrogance this supercilious Gossip shall shake her head at the Ignorance of her Spiritual Guide and pity his unacquaintedness with the Workings of the Spirit of God in the Hearts of Believers and caution her Family and her unbelieving Husband for so he must be if not listed into her own Gang against his dangerous Errours and lamentable Mistakes which poor Man he often Preaches though not out of any bad Design but out of meer Ignorance The poor Wretch she tells them I think is an honest Man and I believe means well but it is a weak and a shallow Divine and an utter stranger to the more inward Mysteries of the Covenant of Grace And now under the Appearance of this Christian Tenderness and Compassion to the poor Soul how insolently will she despise his Person how Magisterially will she censure his Sermons how confidently will she cavil at his Doctrines and how indecently will she laugh at his uncouth and ridiculous Mistakes § 8. Do not think Sir I fancy things Imaginary and meerly possible and create to my self Artificial Men to suit them to my own extravagant Characters I speak mine and your own familiar Experience and you meet with these things and these persons in every days Conversation Neither mistake me as if I charged this Churlish Humour upon every individual Professour 't is enough if it be the Character of the Generality and 't is all I intend For I know there are some that dissent from us of a more modest and submissive temper that are not so restive and inflexible to Authority so head-strong and confident in their own Folly nor so abusive and pragmatical in their Demands But then the Dissent of these Men is silent and peaceable they make no noise and tumult in the Church they are not hasty to censure slander and backbite their Neighbours but study to win their love by courtesie and fair deportment These Good Men are as sensible of the Zealous Insolencies of their Brethren as I can be But then they neither lead the Faction nor contribute much to support it and follow purely the blind guidance of Prejudice and Education And as for such I pity their Weakness and love and honour their Integrity And others there are whose Veins are fill'd with such brisk and generous Blood that there is no Leaven sowre enough utterly to pervert the natural sweetness of their Humours but they will in the Entercourses of Humane Life keep up in spite of the most Malignant Principles the Urbanity of common Conversation and yet in the affairs and discourses of Religion you cannot dissent from their Opinions without inflaming their Passions and if you persist to contradict them you blow up their heat and anger to an open Impatience their Zeal cannot be civil to a Friend of a different Perswasion they will silence all your Arguments with rude and reviling Language oppress you with Noise and Clamour and impertinent Talk and force you to yield to their intolerable Folly And you know Sir some of our Acquaintance that and 't is a sober Truth have no fault but their Religion and who were it not for that might have proved good Men and good Christians But so powerful is this sowre Humour as to vanquish that Candour and Ingenuity that is natural to the People of the English Nation and so contagious as to poison the purest and most untainted Constitutions and to pervert the soundest Minds and the sweetest Dispositions It is Leaven in both its Properties as well in that it sowres as in that it swells the Minds of Men. In brief setting aside those three excellent Graces of Spiritual Pride Ill-nature and Ill-manners I can perceive no great matter these Saints and Gracious People have to brag of above us Moral Men and Graceless Professours § 9. And 't is this sullen Humour lies at the bottom of all our Disturbances They quarrel the Constitutions of our Church not so much because they cannot be satisfied as because they affect Dissatisfaction The Common People have no understanding of the Grounds of their Exceptions and they talk their Scruples by roat The most zealous and